This conference is being recorded. All participants, please stand by. Your conference is now ready to begin. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Q2 results conference call. I would now like to turn the meeting over to Mr. David Spyker. Please go ahead, Mr. Spyker.
Good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining us today. On the call from Freehold are David Hendry, our CFO, and Rob King, our COO. The Q2 delivered consistent results across our North American portfolio. Production of 14,667 Boe a day was in line with the previous quarter and up 9% over Q2 of last year. Year-over-year growth was due to organic growth on both sides of the border, as well as acquisition activity completed in the Midland and Eagle Ford Basins. Revenue of $74 million was in line with expectations, generating funds from operations of $53 million or $0.35 per share. Realized pricing for the quarter of $54.05 for Boe continues to benefit from the premium pricing associated with our U.S. portfolio.
In the US, we realized a 39% uplift over our Canadian realized price due to both quality of oil and proximity to sales points, which significantly reduces pipeline transportation costs. We reduced our long, long-term debt by $7 million during the quarter. Our net debt was increased to $131 million, or 0.5 times trailing funds from operations. This increase in net debt is a result of $24.4 million in income tax deposits being reclassified from a current asset to a long-term asset, due to the expected timeline for appealing assessments with the Canada Revenue Agency. We continue to expect to be successful in challenging the assessment based on the legal advice that we have received.
The diversified, high-quality nature of our North American portfolio has furthered the sustainability of Freehold's dividend, which we have grown to its highest level since 2015. As a consistent income provider, we remain committed to targeting a payout ratio of approximately 60% of forward-looking funds from operations. During periods similar to what we realized during the second quarter, we are very comfortable at higher payout levels, given our low leverage and high-margin business, which we believe results in dividend coverage below US $50 per barrel WTI. Full year, we are anticipating payout ratios in the mid-60% range based on current strip prices. Our Canadian volumes averaged 9,800 Boe a day for the quarter.
No change from the previous quarter, with organic growth offsetting the 225 barrels a day boe a day of production shut-ins associated with the wildfires in Western Canada. This shut-in production has now been restored. Strength in our Canadian portfolio year to date reflects its high-quality nature, well-positioned in the active drilling plays across Western Canada. We have had strong drilling in the Viking, with 62 gross wells drilled, resulting in our oil volume contributions from this play reaching a 3-year high. The Clearwater continues to be a growth area, with 17 wells drilled year to date, driven mainly in the Figure Lake area, with excellent results to date and an active drilling program expected in the second half of the year. Leasing activity has been very robust so far in 2023, with 67 agreements signed during the quarter, yielding bonus revenue of CAD 1 million.
Continuing past the quarter, another 16 leases have been signed, bringing the year-to-date numbers to 83. We're halfway through the year, and we have matched our 2022 levels already. The much-improved health of the industry has been evident across our southern Saskatchewan acreage. We have seen a revitalization of this legacy acreage as smaller, well-financed operators aim to achieve growth in these areas, targeting the Mississippian and Bakken formations. Nearly half of the new leases have targeted development of the Mississippian in southeast Saskatchewan, and approximately 25% are with Mannville heavy oil operators, as they are focused on capitalizing on technological advancements in heavy oil development, along with narrowing Canadian heavy oil differentials. On the U.S. side, our production volumes of 4,867 boe a day were also consistent with the prior quarter and were in line with our expectations.
Rig activity year to date has been strong, with rigs on our acreage setting a high water mark of 31 rigs in April. Current activity is in line with average 2022 levels. The Eagle Ford and Midland Basins are the most active areas in our portfolio, with drilling underpinned by high-quality, investment-grade entities. For those that are watching the webcast, there's a lot going on in this slide. It mirrors the significant drilling activity we are seeing in multiple reservoir benches and from large pad drilling operations. We expect U.S. volumes for the second half of 2023 to benefit from the completion of several of these large multi-well pads, contributing to strengthening volumes throughout the remainder of the year. These pads are high impact and are expected to bring on significant production.
An example is a 19-well pad drilled by CrownQuest on our acreage in the Midland Basin and put on production in Q4 of last year. The little illustration to the right just shows the 19 wells that are targeting several different reservoir benches in a spacing unit. On a gross basis, this pad had a peak rate of 27,000 BOE a day, with average production in the first 6 months of 17,000 BOE a day. To put this into perspective, when started up, 5 of these pads will be equivalent to the current levels of Clearwater oil production in Canada.
While our royalty interest in the pad is 0.5%, the size of the pad and the production from it makes it meaningful to Freehold's net production, contributing 160 boe a day at peak rate and 100 boe a day on a 6-month average. We have several of these high-impact DUCs and permits that we expect to contribute to near-term production growth. Specifically, we anticipate 3 new pads totaling 41 gross wells, 0.6 net wells, operated by Exxon and Pioneer, to be on production in the second half of this year. The combined gross initial productivity of these pads is expected to be around 50,000 boe a day. We continue to reiterate the simplicity of royalties as an asset class to investors. Freehold's dividend remains our primary return mechanism and remains sustainable at commodity prices, material lower than current levels.
Our North American portfolio offers significant diversity, with greater than 350 quality industry payers through 2 countries, 5 provinces, and 8 states. During periods where we saw temporary slowdowns associated with wildfires in Canada, or slowdowns associated with spring breakup, maintaining a North American presence ensured that our return profile remained consistent for our shareholders over the quarter. Our balance sheet remains in a strong position, with capacity to mitigate weakness in commodity prices or support portfolio reinvestment for value-enhancing opportunities. Looking forward, we remain excited about the long-term outlook for Freehold as we continue to strengthen Freehold's asset base, balance sheet, and the long-term sustainability of our business. We will now take the time to answer any questions that investors may have.
Thank you. Yes, we will now take questions from the telephone lines. If you have a question and you are using a speakerphone, please lift your handset before making a selection. If you have a question, please press star one on your device's keypad. You may cancel your question at any time by pressing star two. Thank you. Please press star one at this time if you have a question. There will be a brief pause while the participants register. We thank you for your patience. The first question is from Travis Wood, from National Bank Financial. Please go ahead. Your line is open.
Yeah, thanks, and good morning. David, you talked about a bit of the inventory and the high impact nature of kind of the U.S. development plans and the significance of the pads. I noticed a couple slides here kind of highlighting that, that, that you referenced in your opening remarks. Could you help us, or maybe even remind us, how, how you think about that in terms of your planning around guidance, maybe from the conservative side, or, or is there any risk to that changing in terms of the timing of the production ads? Just kind of how do you think about that? How comfortable are you with the planning?
You kind of talked about the onstream dates from Exxon as an example, but, just help us appreciate, I guess, the risk profile around the timing of that and how you layer that into your plan.
Yeah, thanks for the question, Travis. I've got Rob here, and he's grinding through this stuff every day, so I'll let him answer that.
Hi, Travis. A little bit of context for, you know, you know, I'll, I'll back up just a little bit. When we sort of think about our U.S. portfolio, you know, to keep our production flat, we sort of need somewhere in the 3 to 3.2 net wells. Again, that, that varies depending on what the productivity, you know, is of those underlying wells. That's sort of a general number that, you know, that, that we'd look to. We look at Q3 specifically, and, you know, our forecast has about a little under 1 net well, you know, that we expect to be turned in line and brought on production.
You know, I think what gives us some, some confidence in that in that number for Q3 are those, you know, three pads that Dave talked about in his remarks. You know, just to provide a little bit of color on those. Those, those represent, you know, over 50% of those wells that we expect to be turned in line, you know, in Q3. You know, two are under Exxon, one's under Pioneer. You know, the Exxon, we have one in the in the Eagle Ford. It's a 12 gross wells. We have a 0.7% net royalty interest on those wells. You know, that pad is, is fully complete, with half already reporting production.
You know, Exxon also has a pad in the Midland Houston Ranch, which is 14 gross wells, and we have a larger net royalty interest on that, you know, particular opportunity, 2.3%. You know, that compares to our U.S. average of about 0.6%, 0.7%. This is a meaningful, you know, pad, both on a gross number of wells as well as net to net to Freehold. You know, that pad is over 90% complete. We've had dialogue with, you know, XTO, Exxon's back offices, understanding, you know, when those pads will be, will be coming online. They've already started bringing on, you know, some of those wells on that on that 14 gross well pad. You know, the last is Pioneer in the Midland Eric Sims pad.
You know, that's just 15 gross wells. We have a 0.8% net royalty interest. You know, that pad is fully complete, and we're waiting to see that, you know, that come online shortly.
Okay. That, that's great. Just for some context, I think that the slide that you guys have layered in there, specifically, I think 15, is super useful as we think about the, the impact of that as you lay out the, the working interest across each of those. I'll turn it back. Thank you.
Thanks, Travis.
Thank you. The next question is from Jamie Kubik from CIBC. Please go ahead. Your line is open.
Yeah, good morning, thanks for taking my question. A little bit along the lines of what Travis asked here, I guess, just on the activity in the US, noticed that net wells drilled were down quarter-over-quarter. You did note that the rig activity in April set a high water mark in your US portfolio at 31 rigs on your lands, and rig activity so far has mirrored 2022 levels. Just wondering if you can help us reconcile maybe the difference between gross versus net activity and maybe how that will translate into the production growth you guys are talking about in the H2 . Then maybe a tag on to that question is: Where do you think US production volumes could go to in the H2 ?
Yeah. It's, it's, it's Rob here again, Jamie. You know, in terms of rig activity in the U.S., you know, as you mentioned, we did seriously our highest levels, you know, a little over 30 rigs on our lands in April. You know, that's trended down to about 20 rigs, you know, on the lands currently, which is in line with 2022 average levels. You know, in terms of the lower amount, when we looked at gross drilling activity, you know, quarter-over-quarter, it was pretty similar between, you know, on the U.S. side. You know, we did sort of see, you know, some lower net wells that were drilled.
You know, I think in terms of how that will impact production, we'll see, as you know, it takes somewhere between 3 and 9 months for those wells, once they've been drilled, to be completed and turned in line. That's sort of somewhere in that Q4, Q1 timeframe. A lot, lots, lots can change between then and now. I know you had a second question there. I'm just trying to recall what it is. Apologize.
Yeah, no problem. Just on, you know, I, I guess, a lot of positive commentary on where volumes are headed in the U.S. with respect to the completions that you see coming at you here. Just curious on where you can guide us to as far as where U.S. volumes might, might end up in, in a high case here with what pads are coming on, so?
Yeah. I mean, I think we've given overall guidance in terms of that, you know, 14,500-15,500. You know, and I think as we've said before, we're going to be towards the, you know, bottom, mid-end of that range. You know, I think What gives us encouragement, I'd say, for Q3 is, as Dave talked about, that those three pads bring on over 50,000 barrels a day of gross, you know, and our, you know, That, that could translate to 300-400 barrels a day net to Freehold at those, at those peak rates.
You know, kind of depending on when those, those get turned on, you know, in the quarter, we'll certainly have, you know, we'll, we'll have an impact on, on what we see specifically for Q3. Certainly for the, you know, the second half of 2023, you know, we're encouraged with those volumes.
Okay, maybe just last from me on the Canadian side, you know, your production at 9,800 barrels a day in the quarter, basically flat to Q1, but would have been higher, as you noted, without some of the wildfire impacts. Is it just a mix of different plays that is holding the Canadian side up, or is it one particular play or a couple that you can point us to that are giving you the strong results on the Canadian side?
Yeah. I mean, Q2 is obviously always impacted by spring breakup, this is less about drilling activity and actually more about flush production in Q1 that, that continued into Q2. You know, I think that would be... You know, that specific comment would be very much a Viking, you know, specific commentary. I think the other piece that, you know, buoyed our, our Q2 volumes was just a shallower-than-expected, base decline rate. You know, and that comment would be, you know, a, a much broader comment across, you know, a significant number of our, of our areas in Canada.
Okay. That's it for me. Thank you, guys.
Thanks, Jamie.
Thank you. The next question is from Luke Davis, from RBC. Please go ahead. Your line is open.
Hey, good morning, guys. Apologies, I, I dialed in a little bit late, so sorry if you covered this already. But, curious if you can provide a little bit of detail on new leasing activity, and where, where you would expect to see the most activity going forward, specifically in, in Canada.
Sure. Thanks, Luke. It's Rob here. Yeah, we had a really strong, you know, start to the year on leasing. You know, Dave talked about we've signed 83 leases year to date with 25 counterparties, with another 15-20 or so that we're that we're still negotiating. Put that number in context, you know, 83 was the entire number that we had, you know, in 2022. We've been really encouraged, you know, with our Canadian leasing activity. You know, over half of the 83 leases that we've signed have been in southeast Saskatchewan, targeting, you know, Mississippian opportunities. About a quarter has been Mannville heavy oil, you know, leases, you know, particularly one, you know, private, higher growth operator.
You know, I think the average royalty rate has been 15%, with, with terms that really incentivize drilling. Over 90% of those 83 leases have been to private, you know, or junior, companies who are, who are targeting growth.
That's helpful. Thanks, Rob.
Thank you. There are no further questions at this time. I will turn the call back to Mr. Spyker.
Thank you very much, everyone, for your time today and for your interest in Freehold. Look forward to connecting again with our Q3 results in November. Thank you.
Thank you. The conference call has now ended. Please disconnect your lines at this time, and we thank you for your participation.