OGE Energy (NYSE:OGE) and CenterPoint Energy (NYSE:CNP) said last week that midstream energy company Energy Transfer Partners (NYSE:ET) has completed its acquisition of their Enable Midstream Partners gas-gathering partnership.
The $7.2 billion all-equity transaction was announced in February. (See Energy Transfer to Acquire Enable Midstream.)
OGE, which owned about 79% of Enable’s common units together with CenterPoint, will keep approximately 3% of Energy Transfer’s outstanding limited partner units with the transaction’s consummation. CenterPoint received about 201 million common units of Energy Transfer and $5 million in cash for its common units of Enable and general partner interest.
OGE CEO Sean Trauschke said in a statement that the acquisition “is an important step in OGE’s plan to become a pure-play electric utility.”
“We are now firmly on an accelerated path to reducing our exposure to the midstream industry,” CenterPoint CEO David Lesar said.
Enable was created in 2013 by merging OGE’s Enogex midstream subsidiary with CenterPoint’s pipeline and field services businesses. OGE held a 25.5% limited partner interest and a 50% general partner interest in Enable; CenterPoint owned 53.7% of the common units representing Enable’s limited partner interests.
In early 2020, OGE and CenterPoint took major earnings hits when Enable halved its quarterly distributions to investors and cut its capital expenditures for 2020 by $115 million. The cost reductions came during a global slump in petroleum demand and the COVID-19 pandemic. (See Enable Losses Slam CenterPoint, OGE Energy.)
Energy Transfer now owns and operates more than 114,000 miles of pipelines and related assets in all major producing regions in the U.S. and markets across 41 states.
