Riley Exploration Permian, Inc. (AMEX:REPX) Q4 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

Bobby Riley: Well, John, I appreciate the question. One of the counterparties we’re dealing with is a large slow moving organization that has a very large balance sheet without giving too much away there. And so we’re cognizant of the pace that they move at. The other thing is, the definition of what do you consider closing a scoping project versus an FID or such. So I’m hoping that we can share something with you here at least as far as certain applications and so forth, but we are getting the asset ready. We’ve taken certain moves to further, I guess the positioning. There’s different philosophies on how to sequence those different steps for all the different permits and needs there. We’ve done certain of those, and then I think we’ll be in better position to share more with you kind of mid-year.

John White: I understand the position you’re in and appreciate a little bit of additional detail. Thank you. On the CapEx split between New Mexico and Texas, it looks like you’ve carefully designed the program to do all €“ in first quarter all drilling will be in Yoakum County, and that’s of course to account for the closing date of the New Mexico deal. But I have to think it’s also to give your technical team some time to do further detailed work, subsurface work on the New Mexico assets. Is that correct?

Philip Riley: Yes, that’s a fair way to put it, John. As we said, it compliments each other there. The way those overlap and it’s kind of when I €“ why I went into that extended description of how they tie in there. And let me just give a little bit more color there. So, we’re not giving totally explicit or disaggregated CapEx, but if you look at it, on a legacy basis, we’re actually down year-over-year basically flat to a little bit down. And I challenge you to find many of the companies that are growing or forecasting to grow at the level we are with CapEx being down. Now, some of that is because last year was a little bit higher with more EOR pilot project spend. But either way that’s a bit lower. And then we’ve got a decent amount for the acquisition CapEx there, there’s a couple ways you can back into that, including from the data we gave you in the press release.

But that’s basically reinvesting about half of the EBITDAX we see there from that asset. Like I said, that’ll be more in the middle of the year with the way Kevin described that coming on by summer. But then for the overall year, we see the reinvestment rate declining yet again. Bobby described in his opening remarks and we’ve got there on our slides how our reinvestment rates cash flow went from 88% to 66%. We see that getting down even lower, so I think that’s pretty exciting. There’s been maybe a little bit of confusion. I recognize it’s hard to forecast the coming year before we even gave guidance and with an acquisition. But overall, we see that exciting for those dual components of the legacy CapEx being down and then the really efficient CapEx on the new acquisition.

John White: That’s great additional detail and thank you for it and I’ll respectfully decline to accept your challenge, because I know you know your numbers. Can you refresh me one last time on the completed well cost for the New Mexico asset?

Philip Riley:

John White: I’m sorry, the line’s breaking up.

Philip Riley: Currently the costs are between $5.3 and $5.86, which is mostly driven by the completed cost on that asset.

John White: All right. Thanks very much and I’ll pass it back to the operator.

Operator: Our next question will come from the line of Jeff Robertson with Water Tower Research. Please go ahead.

Jeff Robertson: Thank you. Good morning. On the Yeso assets, can you talk a little bit about any infrastructure issues that you’ll have to deal with as you start? Is Riley’s still on a plan?