Hess Midstream LP (NYSE:HESM) Q4 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

And really just getting us back to that distributed cash flow that we had before the repurchase. And that has allowed us to, as I mentioned in my comments, generate not only the 5% annual growth, but now over the past two years, 27% increase in our dividends just an amazing result, they’re together with the $1.15 billion in repurchases. So I’d say that’s going to be our focus, that’s our priority. Of course, we’ll make decisions each time on what the exact right optimization is in terms of capital structure. But certainly, the strategy that we’ve taken so far, it’s certainly one that we like, and certainly that would be probably our base case going forward. And again multiple opportunities to do this going forward through now through 2025.

John Mackay: All right, that’s great. Maybe just turning to operations. I mean, like there’s always going to be weather up in the Bakken. December was really bad. It was also really bad early on in €˜22. I guess this was a little more of a Hess question. But maybe, could you just talk a little bit around your comfort in kind of not getting pushed to the right again, when there’s bad weather again, up there? I mean, you commented that your guide, and the Hess guide are, I guess, weather adjusted, or there’s some give in there for weather, but maybe just how much kind of conservatism you have in there, and how you’re thinking about that going forward? And whether it’s maybe evolved over the last year or two?

Jonathan Stein: Yes, thanks. I mean, I think it’s somewhat difficult to say, I mean, obviously, North Dakota, there’s weather every year, it snows every year, starting sometime in October, November timeframe, and it kind of carries on through March, April timeframe. And sometimes in the May. 2022 was definitely challenging. It was abnormal weather two times, I mean, it kind of struck twice in one year, we had the freezing rain, earlier in the year in April, May timeframe, and that just totally took out power. And without the power, we obviously couldn’t, we couldn’t list the hydrocarbons, and couldn’t get it to the infrastructure and ultimately, to be processed and shipped out via pipe or rail or to the export markets. So that was the challenge in, at the beginning of the year.

And then in December, we just had abnormally high snowfall, and then very, very cold weather. And so as the team as the upstream team attack the snow with winds and very cold weather, the snow would just blow back. And it was a constant battle for them over that timeframe. I’ve been working in the in the Bakken for going on 12 years. And the weather in 2022 was abnormal. Having said that, the upstream team, and obviously that carries into some of our forecasts as well, they do build in weather contingencies in the first quarter and the fourth quarter of every year. They’re really based more on historical weather contingencies, and not abnormal, I would say that based on what we saw in 2022, we’re probably a little bit gun shy here, going into the first quarter of this year.