Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to the fourth quarter results conference call. I would like to turn the meeting over to Mr. David Spyker. Please go ahead.
Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. On the call with me with Freehold are Rob King, our COO, and David Hendry, our CFO. 2023 was a strong year for Freehold. It really showcased the strengths of our unique North American portfolio, which consists of a robust production base in Canada and a growing oil-weighted position in the US. Total production of 14,714 BOE a day in 2023 was up 4% over the previous year, driven primarily by oil-weighted US production, growing 16% year-over-year to 5,102 BOE a day. Growth on our US assets was driven by the Midland Basin, with volumes up 25% over 2022. Our Canadian portfolio had no decline in production year-over-year. 2023 production in Canada was 9,612 BOE a day, driven by consistent operator activity.
This was achieved in the absence of any material acquisitions and really highlights the quality of our Canadian asset base. For 2024, we're expecting production in the range of 14,700-15,700 BOE a day, implying approximately 3% growth at the midpoint over 2023. Revenue in 2023 was CAD 315 million, and funds from operations was CAD 240 million, both in line with expectations, and funded our annual dividend of CAD 163 million or CAD 1.08 per share. This resulted in a payout ratio of 68% for the full year. We expect to continue to maintain our current dividend level, striking a balance between strong shareholder returns and retaining the ability to continue to fund business growth through reinvestment of excess free cash flow above the dividend.
This strategy has allowed us to reduce our net debt by 27% in 2023 compared to year-end 2022, and facilitate funding of the $115 million in transactions that we announced in December, utilizing the strength of our balance sheet. These December transactions were with two private sellers, and we acquired high-quality Permian mineral title and royalty assets in the Midland Basin in Texas and the Delaware Basin in New Mexico and Texas. Some of the highlights associated with the assets include: 2024 forecast average production of 600 BOE a day, increasing Freehold's Permian production by approximately 30% and the company's US production by 12%. These assets are 85, 85% liquids-weighted production. Of that, most of it is, oil.
On a full basis, it's 65% oil-weighted, and that versus Freehold's US liquids weighting of 78%, and the company's total liquids weighting of 64%, thus providing meaningful uplift to Freehold's realized price. With the assets, we see multiple years of future upside, with greater than 2,000 gross development locations identified, increasing Freehold's total US drilling inventory by 25%. The future development is expected to be underpinned by some of North America's top operators, with the combined ExxonMobil and Pioneer Natural Resources expected to move into Freehold's top five payer lists and represents greater than 25% of future growth locations within the company's US inventory. Pro forma, these transactions are expected to double Freehold's Midland Basin activity, with one in every seven wells drilled in 2023 would have occurred on Freehold's land on this combined asset base.
In total, 993 wells were drilled on our royalty lands in 2023. 95% of the wells drilled targeted oil prospects in Canada and the U.S. Approximately 28% of gross wells on Freehold royalty lands targeted prospects in Alberta, approximately 18% in Saskatchewan, and almost half, at 46%, in Texas, with the balance spread across other regions. We estimate that in 2023, approximately $8 billion in gross third-party capital was spent on our lands, up from $6 billion in 2022. Spending was comprised of $7 billion, about $35 million net on our U.S. royalty assets, and about $1 billion or $34 million net on our Canadian royalty assets. Backstopped by the quality of our asset base, we delivered record level of leasing on our Canadian lands in 2023, with 122 leases signed.
Approximately 10% of these leases have already had wells spud, and we expect to see continued momentum on the drilling on these lands through 2024. The majority of these 122 new leases are made up of Mississippian light oil targets in Southeast Saskatchewan, representing about 51% of the leases, and Mannville heavy oil targets in Alberta, representing about 28% of the leases. We continue to see a revitalization of Southeast Saskatchewan light oil and Mannville heavy oil, with several well-capitalized, growth-oriented junior producers focusing on these areas. Multilateral drilling has been a focus by operators in the heavy oil areas to improve both well productivity and ultimate oil recovery. With our year-end results and our forward look, we're very excited about the position of strength we have in both the quality and the diversity of our portfolio.
Looking forward, we continue to expect robust performance from our assets, generating significant funds flow that will underpin our sustainable dividend, will maintain our balance sheet strength, and fund further growth opportunities on both sides of the border. We will now take the time to answer any questions that investors may have.
Thank you. We will now take questions from the telephone lines. If you have a question, please press star one on your device's keypad. You may cancel the question at any time by pressing star two. Please press star one at this time if you have a question. There will be a brief pause while participants register. Thank you for your patience. The first question is from Travis Wood from National Bank Financial. Please go ahead.
Yeah, good morning, guys. David, you touched on it a bit in your opener in remarks with respect to some M&A activity and Exxon moving up the payer list. With a lot of the M&A activity in the US now, how is that changing your outlook on pace of development on the lands and maybe as important, the lands that have been acquired over the last year or so, has there been a shift in how you see activity picking up with some of the deals more recently in the US?
Yeah. Morning, Travis. I'm gonna turn that over to Rob, just to answer that. He's been pretty active in looking at that as part of, you know, how we assess these opportunities. So Rob, do you wanna handle that?
Sure. Hi, Travis. So yeah, it certainly has been a key focus for us, particularly in the Permian. You know, just to kinda put some numbers around what we sort of look at the Midland Basin, which is our, you know, most of our Permian production is concentrated in. You know, that basin has become a lot more consolidated, you know, between, you know, the Exxon Pioneer combination and the Diamondback and Endeavor combination, you know, those two operators are now more than 50% of Midland production. So it certainly is a lot more concentration under, you know, a handful of names.
You know, I think that's one of the things that got us, you know, super excited with the January transactions that we just closed, just given how much was concentrated under Pioneer in those two transactions. You know, now the combination of Exxon and Pioneer is, you know, both 2,000 of our development inventory locations, which is about, you know, 45% of our of our of our Permian inventories underneath the the combined Pioneer Exxon. You know, and I think what we've also seen, this is just from Exxon's public disclosure, where they talk about how the Pioneer acreage is some of the highest quality, you know, in the Midland Basin.
Relative to what Pioneer's oil growth forecasts were in the, you know, low single-digit rates, you know, Exxon has been talking about, you know, in the 8%-12% annual Permian growth over the next 4 years, which we anticipate a meaningful amount coming from the Pioneer acreage.
Okay. That's great color. Thanks for that, Rob. That's all for me.
Thank you. The next question is from Luke Davis, from RBC. Please go ahead.
Good morning, guys. Just with respect to the most recent Permian acquisitions, can you remind me what the impacts they were expected to have on 2024 volumes, and if any of your kind of initial assumptions or expectations have changed since closing?
Yeah. Hi, Luke, it's Rob here again. So in terms of the two transactions, we expect the two transactions to add about 600 BOE a day to our 2024 production. You know, so we're sort of expecting, you know, in that 3% growth range for our existing, you know, US, you know, assets, plus the 600 BOE a day, you know, from our most recent acquisitions. You know, I think one of the things that really gets us, you know, again, excited about that deal is just, you know, we've added about 30% to our acreage footprint, you know, with those two transactions, with really modest overlap with the existing Permian Midland footprint that we have.
So we're really, you know, kind of getting more of that, what we like to call, wall-to-wall carpeting, you know, across the Midland Basin. You know, and we're in January, at least, we are capturing, you know, 1 in 5 of the rig activity, you know, in the Midland Basin, you know, kind of up from that 1 in 7 number that Dave mentioned in his remarks in 2023.
That's helpful. Thanks. And, historically, you've provided some context just in terms of the amount of deals that you've evaluated. Just curious if you can give us a sense for, how much is currently available, what you guys have been looking at, and sort of contextualize that within the last year or two.
Sure. You know, we in the Q4 still looked at about 20 deals coming across our plate, about $1.5 billion worth of value. That's sort of on trend for the over 100 deals that came across that we actually evaluated. Saw a lot more than that, but those are the ones that we actually looked at. Most of those are still on the US side, 70%, you know, focused on the US front. We probably took our gas foot off the accelerator a little bit, you know, just given we got traction on these two deals in late October, November timeframe.
So sort of, you know, turned our attention to, you know, to evaluating these and getting, you know, and getting these two deals across the finish line. You know, 2024 looks strong, you know, again. You know, we probably—we were down in, in, at the NAPE conference in Houston a few weeks back, and just the amount of conversations and opportunities that have come out over the last three weeks since NAPE has been pretty impressive.
... That's helpful. Thank you.
Thank you. The next question is from Patrick O'Rourke from ATB Capital Markets. Please go ahead.
Well, hey, guys. Good morning, and thank you for taking my question here. I'm just kind of wondering, maybe shifting back, and this will be more Canadian-oriented, but in terms of the leasing activity, I think that you guys had a record year in 2023 here. You spoke a little bit to it in the preamble there. Just wondering if you can sort of unpack a little bit more granularity in terms of what the, you know, the key trends you're seeing. And then I think you spoke to some of the multilateral development. In terms of your inventory of available lands for leasing, sort of where you sit in that life cycle and, you know, where the land rush is, maybe inning-wise?
Yeah. Rob here, Patrick. So the little more color on it, as Dave mentioned, 122 leases, 41 counterparties. You know, the vast majority of it was concentrated in two plays, Southeast Saskatchewan Mississippian, and Mannville Heavy Oil in Eastern Alberta. You know, it's where, gosh, 80%+ of the leasing was. You know, Duvernay would be the next largest, you know, amount, but that'd be a lot smaller, you know, than those other two. You know, the nature of the companies taking the leases are sort of on that private slash junior E&P front. And they've already been, you know, active, you know, on, you know, probably importantly, translating that leasing into drilling.
You know, we've already seen about 15 of those 122 leases, you know, having spuds on them. So you know, that, that's encouraging. You know, for us, you know, we are anticipating, you know, a rotation, you know, in our Canadian drilling results from, you know, maybe less Viking, but more Southeast Saskatchewan and more Mannville Heavy Oil. You know, in terms of what inning that we're at, I mean, I think there's a lot more opportunity set that we see in both Southeast Saskatchewan and Mannville Heavy, in particular. You know, so I'd say, you know, early, early innings would be my comment.
I would just add to that a little bit, Patrick, that, you know, we talk about the multilateral drilling in the heavy oil, but, you know, certainly multilateral drilling has been rolling out in Southeast Saskatchewan a little bit with a number of operators. You're looking at the Bakken with the multilateral, see some licensing in Southwest Saskatchewan now in that Shaunavon area. So I think as, you know, this multilateral technology, you know, that, that's where I think we're in some of the earliest innings where we can unlock value. And so, you're watching that closely, and as Rob referenced, we have lots of opportunities that we see on our land base, you know, that that will really benefit from some of that work that's being tested.
I guess the follow-up question from me would be, you know, in terms of your confidence in the productivity and the results you're gonna see, and obviously, you know, the challenge, you know, with providing guidance on the production side, you don't have full control over the drill bit. You're at the behest of some of these producers that have leased off you. I'm just wondering, you know, what sort of risking and sort of parameters or outlook you have in terms of when you can have more confidence in providing some, you know, guidance to potential growth there, or how that kind of, you know, evolves over time here in terms of a lag between lease to conversion to, you know, forward outlook for production there?
Yeah. I mean, some of those 122 leases, about 10% of those, we actually had, you know, drilling obligations associated with those. So you get some perspective on it. We've kept the average term, you know, on those leases to 2 years, so it does help, you know, in terms of incentivizing the, you know, the driller to either, you know, get after it, or the land, you know, comes back to us, and we get to do it all over again.
You know, you're right, coming out of spring breakup is really when we'll be able to have a much better, you know, feel for, sort of how the operators are feeling with some recent, you know, softness, particularly on the gas side, but, you know, also on the oil side as well.
Okay, thank you.
Thank you. The next question is from Aaron Bilkoski from TD Cowen. Sorry. Please go ahead.
Thanks. Morning, guys. So I wanted to follow up a little bit on Luke and Patrick's questions. You talked about U.S. assets growing 3%-4% before the acquired volumes. How do you see the Canadian production trending throughout the year? And I guess the follow-up question to that is, how much of that opportunity you just spoke about is baked into your 2024 guidance already?
Aaron, Rob here. So in terms of our Canadian production, you know, I think we are, there's sort of two things that are causing a what I would sort of call a modest downtick on the Canadian volumes. One, you know, there's probably a lot more detail than we need to give, but we'll give it anyways. You know, one, we sort of have a production volume royalty agreement with Tourmaline that is contractually declining by about 100 BOEs a day.
You know, this is a natural gas volume, so, you know, the revenue impact is, like, less than half a percentage point, you know, so it's very marginal impact on what matters the most, being cash flow, but does have a volume, you know, impact, and that's something that we're just needing to manage. You know, the other, I think is that, you know, we just talked about it with Patrick in terms of the change, the transition that we're seeing, where there's gonna be in our portfolio, less Viking drilling and more Southeast Saskatchewan, more Mannville heavy oil drilling. You know, so the lease conversion that we're expecting is baked into our 2024 numbers.
It's in that range that we provided. But those sort of two factors in the Canadian side, you know, it's probably gonna be where we believe our Canadian volumes are gonna be flat to, like, slightly 1%-ish down.
Then maybe just a little bit more color there. You know, our Canadian portfolio, you know, has been 9,600 BOE a day for the last three years, like 9,620. And, you know, with that, it's only with, you know, modest early-stage investment in the Clearwater. And so when we, when we look at that, you know, even though that 95% of our drilling activity is oil-focused, those gas wells, you know, do have, you know, more of a BOE impact. Although, to Rob's point, not much of a fund flow or cash flow impact, you know, for our business. And so when we look at Canada, we're just taking a little bit more conservative perspective, you know, given the weakness in gas pricing.
But, you know, again, it's got a pretty strong history of delivering. As we, you know, look at those leases that we've got signed, we look at the activity that we're seeing, that's kind of why, you know, we're feeling, yeah, it's probably gonna be another year of fourth year in a row of ± that same 9,600 BOE a day. You know, with the contractual step down in that PVR of 100 BOE a day at gas. But we think that, you know, we're gonna make that up as we go throughout the year, but, you know, those are later in year volumes that will come out of the drilling on the new lands or the lease lands.
Thanks. Could I ask another question? In last year's annual report, you mentioned Freehold was advancing the technical due diligence on several modest-sized development stage opportunities, including potash. I guess, what did you learn from this process, and are you still looking at these types of non-energy royalty structures?
Yeah, we're still looking at them, Aaron. You know, like, you know, we've had, you know, I'll call some really small, you know, level of success on the potash. You're really acquiring some additional mineral title on that potash side. You know, to date, it hasn't been a needle mover. It's good, it's good business. Some of the other opportunities that, you know, we're digging into a little bit more on a due diligence side have fallen away. And so some of it, you know, with regulatory concerns that we've stepped away. And so, you know, we're still looking at a lot of stuff, but, you know, a cautious approach.
You know, we do recognize that, you know, when you look at the returns that we're getting on the U.S. investments, you know, you really... You know, since we really stepped into the U.S., you know, we've already recovered half of that investment through revenue and, you know, it contributed $131 million of revenue last year and 5,100 barrels a day. You know, we've got to be pretty careful when we evaluate an opportunity outside of oil and gas, that it can compete for those returns, or in the long term, really make us a much better sustainable company. So, you know, we're looking at a lot of stuff and but taking a cautious approach.
You know, we don't want to get ahead of ourselves, you know what we can invest in our base business right now.
Thanks for the answer. I appreciate that.
Thank you. Once again, please press star one if you have a question. The next question is from Christopher Jones from Haywood Securities. Please go ahead.
Hey, thanks for taking my question. Just coming back to the M&A scene. Freehold has been active in acquiring royalty assets in the US, but what is your view on corporate consolidation within the mineral space in the US? Do you think it will play catch up with the E&P consolidation that the market has seen? And what, if any, opportunities would this create for Freehold? And then maybe just remind us of some of the different dynamics in the US versus Canada as it relates to potential acquisitions. Thank you.
What was the last part of your question there, Chris?
Yeah, just maybe remind us of some of the different dynamics in the U.S. versus Canada and kind of how that relates to potential acquisition opportunities.
Yeah, I think that, you know, from the consolidation opportunities, you know, we did see a little bit of that with, you know, Sitio and Brigham early last year on the royalty front. We don't get a sense that, you know, there's a lot of discussion there, and nor do we view that it makes a lot of sense for us at this point. When you look at a U.S. shareholder base versus our shareholder base, which is a predominantly Canadian shareholder base, when you look at. You know, we're a dividend-paying company in Canada, and U.S. shareholders in a U.S. consolidation. At this point, you know, we're not looking at that as an opportunity.
We, we see. You know, more opportunity just to continue to add lands like we did with this, December transactions that, that, closed in January. We can just be really, really targeted on, on, on the land that we wanna bring into the portfolio. We've kind of got a, a bit of a, a sweet spot to identify that we're focusing on. And as Rob referenced, your goal, ideally, in, in, acquisition work would be the, a wall-to-wall carpeting or full coverage in, in the, the sweet spot, so that, any drilling activity that would happen, in those areas would be on lands that we have a royalty interest in. So if we think broader, acquisition strategy, that's how we're thinking about it right now.
It's much more, you know, bespoke type acquisitions that really fit specific criteria in building out sweet spots in the basins that we have identified.
You know, Chris, a few of the big differences between Canada and the US, I mean, the US, in the areas that we care about, really being Texas, you know, that's effectively 100% privately owned mineral title, you know, as opposed to Canada, which the vast majority is held by the provincial crown, you know, governments. So, you know, the opportunity set. Not only do you sort of have, like, in a Midland Basin, where there's, you know, almost 5 million barrels a day of oil production, you know, you also have 100% mineral title that's available. Multiply those two together, and you just have a significant opportunity set. You know, to kind of put that in context, you know, the average mineral title royalty in Texas is about 25%.
You know, our average net royalty interest in Texas is 0.5%. You know, so even on the lands that we have, you know, there's another 24.5% interest that we could, that we can, that we can continue to add. So, you know, that's a bit of why the opportunity set is as big as it is in the U.S., and it's just so, you know, it even though there's half a dozen of the public companies, you know, they control about 2% of the overall value of, of mineral title that's available in the U.S.
Great. Thank you for that.
Thank you. There are no further questions registered at this time. I'd like to turn the call back over to Mr. Spyker.
All right. Thank you, everybody, for participating today. A good active dialogue, and we appreciate the questions. We look forward to catching up with everybody in May on our Q1 results. Thank you.
Thank you. The conference has now ended. Please disconnect your lines at this time, and we thank you for your participation.