discussion, I would like to remind participants that today's talk could include forward-looking statements as of today, October 16, 2024. Ring's disclosures regarding such forward-looking disclosures can be found under the Investor Relations tab of the company's corporate homepage. With that bit of housekeeping out of the way, Paul, I want to welcome you and thank you for taking the time to join us today.
Yeah, you're welcome, and thank you for having me. I'd also like to thank all the interested parties that are interested in Ring Energy, and for joining us today. Appreciate it.
Great. Today's discussion, we will reference one of the slides, I think it's Slide 16 on the most recent corporate presentation deck.
Yep.
That presentation is also available on the company's homepage under the Presentations tab. Ring is an exploration and production company whose assets are concentrated in conventional plays in the Permian Basin, targeting the San Andres Formation on the Northwest Shelf and multiple stacked reservoirs on the Central Basin Platform. Transformative acquisitions completed over the last two years have added scale to the asset base, increasing the company's capacity to generate free cash flow. Ring has generated adjusted free cash flow for 19 consecutive quarters, and management's quest to drive value through balance sheet accretive growth and balance sheet improvements. Total liquidity was $194 million at the end of the Q2 , and the leverage ratio was about 1.6 times.
In August, Ring increased its full year 2024 production guidance, mainly reflecting strong year-to-date performance on new wells and operational efficiency gains. Paul, I'd like to start with the growth through acquisition strategy and how you think about, excuse me, pursuing, acquisitions to help scale the balance sheet. Can you just talk about the two objectives and how they relate to growing value and gaining exposure to a broader, potential investor group?
Yes, Jeff, you've heard me say in the past that we want to grow the size and scale of the company allows Ring to be more relevant to a larger cross-section of the investment community. There are large funds and institutional buyers that don't really consider Ring as a qualified investment because of various different things, whether it's market cap or enterprise value, or perhaps our stock price falls below a certain threshold or size. But whatever the issue may be, the fact remains we don't qualify, okay? But you've also heard me say that we don't want to get larger just for the sake of getting larger. Our historical growth and our intentions regarding our future growth are all centered around profitable growth, growth and accretion to our existing shareholders.
We have linked these two objectives together in our strategy, profitability and accretion to our stockholders, as important components that will guide our future A&D activity.
We talk about scale, and a lot of times people focus on the asset base and production and reserves and things like that. But scale also adds to the balance sheet. Can you talk about how you think about scaling the balance sheet alongside of acquisitions to allow you to, as you said, not only get big for big sake, but to get bigger and better through your strategy?
Yeah, real simple. Adding more producing assets to our portfolio adds more PV-10 value to the balance sheet and increasing the size of the total assets of the company. A larger asset base can qualify for a larger credit facility, which in turn, if the balance sheet is properly managed, can provide more liquidity to a company so it can use to grow. The key here is ensuring you manage your debt levels so that the full strength of the balance sheet can be accessible to the management when opportunity actually arrives.
So is one way to think about it, Paul, that essentially the EBITDA that you add through an acquisition, even though there may be some debt associated with an acquisition, you could have better credit metrics in terms of leverage ratios, even though there's a little bit more absolute debt on the balance sheet just because of the scale added on the asset base?
Absolutely. Okay, so when you think about that and the combination, the whole goal through acquisitions and managing your balance sheet and increasing the strength of the balance sheet is having more collateral to put against the loans you borrow from the bank to acquire those assets. So you gotta buy them right, and you gotta structure your deal so that you improve that balance sheet. So, if you go back to some of the standard methods of assessing the health of a company, a lot of people really focus, especially today, on that leverage ratio, right? Well, the leverage ratio is not only, is the debt with respect to the trailing twelve months of EBITDA.
And so, you gotta structure the deal right, you gotta buy the deal right, and you also need to be acquiring the right type of assets to make all of it.
When you think about the three acquisitions that you, that Ring has completed over the last couple of years, and you have gotten bigger, I think you've tripled the production base of the company over the last three years or so. But does the increased size that you've achieved so far, does that change how you think about the ideal acquisition for the asset base today versus what it might have been two years ago?
We're still looking for certain asset characteristics in everything we do, okay, and so the size may not be as the characteristics and the quality of the assets that we're trying to acquire. We're always looking to acquire certain types. We're seeking PDP assets with high operating margins, with shallow declines and long lives. We're also concentrating on acquiring assets that produce primarily oil or liquids-rich production. These characteristics really go back to defining and contributing to a lot of other aspects that we try to manage in the company in terms of profitable growth and balancing out and managing the balance sheet.
Pardon me. Paul, depending on circumstances, Ring has used both equity and debt to fund acquisitions in a combination. How do you evaluate the appropriate mix for funding a transaction, just given the overall balance sheet goals you hope to achieve?
Yeah. Yeah, so the appropriate funding mix centers around accretion to our existing stockholders, okay? The next most important consideration is whether or not the mix improves the balance sheet. Our strategy is to maximize both of these as we profitably grow the company. It's a lot easier said than done, especially in today's market.
We've talked a lot in the past on Fireside Chats about your preference for conventional assets and how they fit the model that you're pursuing.
Right.
How in the context of capital intensity, which gets a lot of talk, how do conventional assets help you manage Ring's capital intensity?
Yeah. So, that's a very good point, and it's often times missed, especially in today's world, where the industry is primarily focused on these unconventional assets that have steeper declines and shallower and shorter lives. But the conventional assets generally have shallower declines, which lead to longer lives. The lower decline rate of the company's portfolio means the less production a company would need to replace before they can actually grow, okay? So this leads to a lower capital intensity required to replace and maintain their production.
The industry, Paul, is obviously focused on unconventional assets for the last going on twenty years, I guess, since the Haynesville Shale really took off.
Mm
And the Barnett before that. But so there's a lot of focus on technology improvements for unconventional reservoirs. Where, with respect to conventional assets, the types that Ring would like to acquire and that you own today, where do you see the greatest opportunity to add value through advanced drilling and completion technologies to the types of assets that you're interested in?
Yeah. So, you know, describing that in a way that's meaningful, sometimes challenging, depending on, their knowledge of the industry and what's happened. But hydrocarbons have been discovered in what has historically been considered uneconomic rock with the technologies that were available at the time that those discoveries were made, okay? So those hydrocarbon resources were typically forgotten about, and many are still waiting to have modern drilling and completion technology applied, okay? So a good example of that is the now well-established San Andres horizontal oil play. The San Andres is a conventional reservoir, that historically was limited in terms of the development based on the economics of the vertical wells that they drilled at the time.
But then along came the horizontal drilling and completion technologies, and lo and behold, when you applied that technology to what was historically considered uneconomic resource, well, it became economic. And so, if you look at every basin in the United States, we've discovered an uneconomic hydrocarbon resource. And so, this is going to be the new trend. And we've been working on this strategy now since I've come here to Ring. But I believe we're seeing the transition occur today, where the industry is now becoming more and more focused on these assets, the reserves that have been found. They were not considered reserves at the time. They were just hydrocarbon resource because it was uneconomic. Well, today, with today's technology, many of those resources can now be classified as reserves. We now believe they're economic.
And so, I think as you see the Midland and Delaware Basins get locked up by the larger companies, other companies are gonna have to look for other places to grow, and this is where the industry is gonna go. They're gonna follow suit in what we've been doing now for the last four years.
Can you talk about incremental returns? So you obviously buy an asset with the notion of the PDP. You've got a PDP component and a development component. In today's world, can you talk about how you think about the incremental returns on your existing development and exploitation inventory?
Yeah, yeah. So every decision we make at our company is considered with respect to one overriding objective, and that is maximizing free cash flow generation. And so when we look at assets to be acquired, the incremental returns, we compare them to the existing portfolio we have. The last thing we want to do is acquire assets that don't compete in our portfolio, because they'll just sit idle, because we're constantly, you know, allocating our capital to the projects that have the highest returns. And so everything in our company is focused on maximizing free cash flow generation. You take a portion of that free cash flow to maintain your production, that goes back to capital intensity, and the rest of it, you pay down debt.
When you get your debt levels down to a reasonable level, then you look at other opportunities to use that free cash flow.
There's been a lot of talk in the unconventional plays, Paul, about drilling longer laterals, which increase the service intensity of those wells with both in terms of drilling and also completions. Can you talk about the service intensity of Ring's asset base and maybe how that compares to an unconventional shale player, and then also what it means for the kind of cost inflation that you see through cycles?
Yeah, and so that is an important distinguishing difference between what we're doing and the companies that are pursuing the developments in the Midland and Delaware Basins. Because the assets that we're developing on the Central Basin Platform are typically of shallower depths, we don't require those same rigs with the higher horsepower that are necessary for the Delaware and Midland Basins, because they're at much deeper depths. And so we find there's a lot less competition for the rigs that we need, and so the service intensity there is just. We haven't had a challenge at all, you know, attracting and contracting with rigs to drill our wells. Now, on the completion side, for pumping services, well, we're all in competition for the same pumping services.
Everybody, right now, the technologies that we're using involve fracking wells, and so the competition is there, and so there we focus on communicating really well with the service providers that we have relationships with, and we make sure we communicate when we need them way out in advance so that we can plan and organize our work, so currently, in my opinion, I think that the service intensity of the overall Permian Basin, that includes the Central Basin Platform, Midland Basin, and also the Delaware Basin, I believe that the service industry is designed and geared for a higher level of activity than we currently have.
And because the service industry is designed for a higher level of activity, right now we're not having a hard time securing any of the services that we need for our wells.
In your latest corporate presentation, you put a slide in, and that talks about the Central Basin Platform, and it basically says that the Central Basin Platform is the remaining underexplored opportunity of the shale era in the Permian Basin. You mentioned also, Paul. We've seen it with the consolidation that the Midland Basin and Delaware Basin have become a hot target for very large companies to block up very large positions.
Right.
Why, why do you believe the Central Basin Platform and the Northwest Shelf, where you operate, are target-rich environments for your, for your existing strategy?
Yeah, and so these areas, the Central Basin Platform and the southern portion of the Northwest Shelf, have not had the industry focus, nor the capital spending levels that Delaware Basin and Midland Basin have had for the past decade or more. These areas are also more characterized by conventional assets, with zones that fall into the category we've been discussing, zones that can benefit considerably from the application of modern drilling and completion technology. And so we've become experts at identifying what I call missed low permeability pay, and applying these technologies and making those resources economic. And so, because up until recently, the industry's been solely focused on the two big basins, that has left the Central Basin Platform and Northwest Shelf available for us to acquire and to continue to apply our strategy to.
So is it fair to characterize it as still a pretty fragmented, or the most fragmented part of the Permian Basin, perhaps, and also an area where the existing producing assets have largely been maybe not neglected, but the owners haven't been pushing the technology envelope to try to materially improve recoveries, and that creates opportunity? Is that the way we should think about it?
That's the way we've been thinking about it. When we came to Ring in the Q4 of 2020, we looked at what was going on in the industry, and where were the opportunities, and where was the really high entry costs, and where were the areas that still had a lot of potential, but the entry costs were a lot less? And so that's primarily the reason why. Now, of course, it was also fortuitous that Ring Energy had assets in the very areas that we were focused. But that goes back to the previous management team and their insights associated with, and their strategy associated with creating value for their shareholders. And so the overall strategy of the previous management team is not a whole lot different from ours. It's a very similar strategy.
We've just taken it to another level.
Paul, the development in certain parts of the Permian Basin, especially the Delaware Basin, has been hampered from time to time by the need to build incremental infrastructure.
Right
both on oil, but also, on natural gas. Do you, with the activity and history of the Central Basin Platform and Northwest Shelf, are there any meaningful infrastructure limitations that you think about, either with your current assets or that you have to consider when you look at acquisition opportunities?
Yeah. Yeah, I'll have to get you to define "meaningful," but some limitations, but they're more about improving rather than building out new infrastructure, okay? And so the infrastructure in these areas were developed for the conventional assets developed in the past that did not require as much produced water disposal, nor did it have as high of electricity demand. And so, if you look at our wells today, we're producing much larger volumes of water, and oftentimes, when you initially complete your well, you're putting an electrical submersible pump in the hole that requires much more electricity demand than does a pumping unit.
And so what we find is that in some areas, electricity delivery capacity is not quite what we need, so we gotta, you know, upgrade the electrical system, put in bigger transformers, and all that kind of stuff. The other thing is we needed to enhance the saltwater disposal. We like to own our saltwater disposal systems and manage them ourselves. That's kind of a key component of how we manage and limit and reduce our overall operating costs. Those are the two big ones, but other issues that everybody deals with is, is there enough fresh water for your frac jobs? And we've learned to manage that also very well by using produced water.
We've become experts at using produced water, cleaning it up, and getting it in a condition so that we can generate the proper rheologies with our frac fluids and get our sand placed away, and all that kind of other stuff, then last but not least, I guess when you think about infrastructure, because we are in a more mature area that's been developed since really the 1920s, 1930s, and 1940s, the natural gas takeaway is a little bit more mature, and so the reliability of some of the gas gatherers is not as high as it would be in a new area. So that's something that we deal with quite a bit is natural gas system downtime, and so we'll see about that.
But all of that is being addressed, and so I look at it. Although there are minor limitations in that regard, they don't really stand in the way of our growth, and the opportunities that we see out there in the Central Basin Platform.
One of the things you point out on the slide that I've, that I talked about, which is Slide 16, is that, and we talked a little bit about it earlier, was the fragmented nature of ownership out in the Central Basin Platform in the Northwest Shelf. Do you think that the consolidation that's been taking place in the industry over the last couple of years will cause assets in the area that you are most interested in to be put on the market as some of those owners rationalize their portfolios and decide what really the core of the of whatever their new company is?
Yes, I do, and I believe we've already seen this with the large CBP and Northwest Shelf asset package that hit the market this summer. As you know, APA Corporation had a very large package out there for sale, and we actually tried to compete for some of those assets. ExxonMobil also had a very sizable position out there. Nothing's been announced about that yet. We believe there are more to come, and we also believe that many of the private equity owners of assets out there in the Central Basin Platform, Northwest Shelf, will also be hitting the market in the future. The timing of that is kind of hard to predict, but we believe that all of these things, with additional larger company dispositions, are gonna play very well into our strategy associated with growth out here.
Do you think that some of the concentration in the Midland and Delaware Basins will increase competition for assets on the Central Basin Platform and Northwest Shelf?
Yeah. We've seen that already occur, right? And so, APA Corporation's already announced the amount of money they sold their assets for, which, in my analysis, is on the high end. I think it's set a new high watermark for some of the assets out there. I hope that the rest of the industry doesn't believe that they'll achieve those types of levels. And so we'll see. You know, historically, we found very little competition for these assets, but now it appears that the CBP and Northwest Shelf are getting a lot more focus and competition because the reality is that the Delaware Basin and the Midland Basin are essentially locked up.
And so if anybody is looking for the additional assets to develop and profitably develop, I think the Central Basin Platform is getting a lot more focus today. And so we've been saying this for a long time. I've been kind of trying to prepare for the day when the competition arrives. I think the competition has arrived. I'd like to have seen it not arrive for a few more years, but hey, that's just the way it is.
I guess fortunately, back to the bigger is not always necessarily better, the acquisitions that you have made over the last couple of years have added quite a bit of development opportunity to your asset base-
Yeah
To complement what you see in the acquisition market.
Yeah, they, they really have. We're really proud of the progress we've made, and if you go back to my presentation materials, you know, on page four, I think, on the most recent presentation we have out there, kind of summarizes the progress we've had over the last few years growing the company. We have a very handsome compounded annual growth rate through acquisitions. And I think that you can just... If you go back and do the metrics, you can see the profitability on a per-share basis across the board in most of the metrics that the industry is basically measured on. We're very proud of what we've done.
And so, it's been a challenge because, you know, when we arrived here, we had a very, very heavily loaded balance sheet with debt. And getting those debt levels down while also continuing to grow to become more relevant in the marketplace has not been the easiest thing. But we do have a track record now of a good, solid three years. The last two transactions, I think the last three transactions, have demonstrated, you know, you know, what this management team is capable of, so...
We've talked today and previously about the idea of scaling the asset base and the balance sheet through acquisitions to grow the company and improve Ring's leverage profile. Paul, you've talked about that as really the ultimate goal, and maybe it goes back to your point about being relevant to a broader set of investors, about ultimately positioning the company to consider alternatives to return cash to shareholders.
Right.
How do you think about free cash flow and the leverage thresholds that Ring would need to achieve before the board can really consider some sort of plan to return cash?
Yeah, pardon me. Hold on one second. Pardon me. So yeah, a leverage ratio, comfortably below one, will be necessary, okay? We have seen in the past, and I think you can back me up on this, Jeff. There's a premium a company can achieve in the marketplace by having very low leverage. We are a very capital-intensive industry that requires capital to grow and develop reserves. But the real health of the company and the real measure of business acumen of any management team is how well you manage that balance sheet. And so, like we said, growth for growth's sake is a failed strategy, but growth with a properly managed and improving balance sheet is demonstration of a healthy company.
And so going back to the question that you asked, yeah, the leverage ratio is gonna need to be comfortably below one. But you also got to remember there's other things, too, now. The size and scale of the balance sheet or the company has to be there as well. So you need to have the ability to not only return capital to your shareholders at a competitive rate, but it also needs to be sustainable. So that's why size and scale and of the company and the balance sheet are so important. So it's basically both-
Do you consider the reinvestment rate in the asset base of what it needs to maintain production and maybe grow a little bit as one of the components to how you think about free cash flow generation and ultimately having free cash flow to distribute to shareholders?
Yeah. So you're touching on things that are, are very intertwined, so to speak. You know, they all depend on each other. So, reducing the investment rate if needed to maintain production and liquidity is, you know... it's very important and leads to our ability to return cash to stockholders. Okay, so, this is why we are and will continue to be laser focused on maximizing free cash flow generation. Everything circles around free cash flow generation.
If every investment you make is the next capital investment that can bring you the highest free cash flow generation after the investment is made, and you continue to focus there, and you continue to focus on your operations in terms of reducing your costs and improving your margins, all of these things lead to positioning the company so you can return cash to shareholders, when you get to that sustainable size, in the industries to do so.
I'd like to touch on budgeting. I can imagine you've been like most E&P companies, are probably in some part of their twenty twenty-five budget cycle. So I don't want to ask for a specific number, 'cause I know you've not put out guidance for next year yet and won't for some time. But can you talk, Paul, about the process that you go through, trying to construct a budget, especially in the face of what's been happening recently over the last couple of months, a volatile commodity price outlook?
Yeah. So, no, we have not put our budget together for you, that we're actually running sensitivities now on various capital spending levels versus different pricing environments and all that kind of stuff. And so, all that is necessary. So this is also, and we haven't talked much about this today, but, you know, we talked in the past about break-even costs. And so that's a real easy concept to understand: what is the price per barrel of oil necessary for you to break even on your capital investments? And so, when I first got here in 2020, our analysis showed that our break-even costs were around $25. Since that time, we've been in an inflationary environment where the cost of goods and services, drilling wells have come up.
So the cost, the break-even cost for our investments, yeah, is more around $30 or $35 or so. Okay, so a lot of people would say, "Okay, well, so you can withstand any really low oil price." Well, not really, because you've got to remember, those are your break-even costs for drilling the wells, and so there's other costs. You've got, you know, salaries and G&A, you've got interest expense on our loans. So when you look at the total cost of running the organization, and you look at your goals that you've set for debt repayment, there comes a price that, you know, the cash flow generation and the ability to pay down debt compete for capital, okay?
Right now, that threshold for us and our organization, if you get below $65 for on a sustainable basis, we will start prioritizing debt repayment instead of capital spending. And so you can see its effect. So going back to your original question, you know, with respect to budgeting, I'd like to use $70 to $80-$85, maybe as high as $90. I don't know if we'll see $90 anytime soon, but $70, we can comfortably grow the company and meet or exceed our debt repayment goals. Now, when you fall below $70, then we start getting a little concerned. But again, that would be on a sustained basis. And so that kind of. I hope that answered your question. It kind of puts a little bit of perspective as to where we are.
Interest expenses, interest expense right now is a very large item, you know, when you look at our monthly and quarterly expenses... and, and we want to get that interest expense paid down. And so that, and righting our balance sheet and improving our leverage ratio is such a high goal and high objective within our company. We're very focused on that. And so when oil prices fall, you know, to that $65-dollar level, we'll start reallocating our free cash flow towards, you know, improving the balance sheet, and, we'll worry less about, production growth, in times like that.
This is, I guess as a follow-up to that, and maybe some of the priorities that you spoke about with respect to capital allocation. But in the future, if you get to the point, or when you get to the point, to be able to put in some sort of a cash return to shareholder program, can you talk a little bit about how that will affect your capital allocation priorities between investing in the underlying asset base to maintain and grow, saving dry powder to be able to look at acquisitions and achieve your balance sheet goals? But also, as you mentioned, if you have a dividend or have some sort of capital return plan, it needs to be something that is sustainable.
Yeah, and so this goes back to our strategy. Our financial strategy is to maximize free cash flow generation, improve the balance sheet. Well, the same budget allocating process that leads to that also leads to the same environment, to where once your balance sheet is where you want it, it's also the same strategy necessary to return cash to shareholders, or use that cash for even accelerated growth through acquisitions or whatever. You can also allocate capital towards more risky projects that might have the opportunity for a much bigger return, but because the risk profile goes up, you know, you don't want to allocate too large a portion, but it does allow for the explosive growth opportunity.
So the financial strategy and the overall strategy of maximizing free cash flow generation lends to everything. No matter what we do in the future, by focusing on free cash flow generation, it will allow us to transition from a period of time where we are more focused on reducing debt, and then focus on getting the size and scale to be sustainable, and it also leads to the environment where now you are returning cash to shareholders. By focusing on free cash flow generation, it allows you to achieve all of those. And so it really does not change much for us.
We're focused on free cash flow generation, and as time goes on, when we get that size and scale, we get our leverage ratio in the right spot, it'll be the same strategy that carries us into a very healthy, competitive, and sustainable return in general.
So it'd be a higher quality problem to have, as you get bigger?
Absolutely.
We, we've talked about a lot of different things, including scaling the balance sheet, today, and the reason why the Central Basin Platform and Northwest Shelf really fit into your acquisition, or growth through acquisition strategy, and then some of the balance sheet goals. But, Paul, I'd like you to just to summarize for us where you think Ring is in that evolution of bigger, and getting bigger and better, and positioning the company or positioning the free cash flow profile and the balance sheet for where you want it to be.
Yeah. And so the first thing I'll tell you is, again, go back to page four of our latest presentation, look at our growth history. Look at what we've done. When we first came on board, we did not have that proven track record, but now we've got several transactions behind us that have demonstrated profitable growth for our shareholders. We've demonstrated our commitment to reducing debt and improving the balance sheet. Those are not easy things to do at the same time, and so it takes a lot of planning. You've got to structure your deals right. You've got to find the right deal. You've got to have the discipline not to get caught up in the fury of the competition and pay more for assets than you should.
So you've got to know when to hold them, and you've got to know when to fold them, so to speak, right? And so, I, I'll say, look at our history. Where we are today, we are in a much healthier position to continue this growth going forward than we have ever been. And I look at the opportunity. So 2025 appears to me to be a great year for growth. So far this year, we haven't been able to bring down another profitable acquisition. That hasn't been from the lack of trying. There's been more competition.
But one of the other things that we haven't talked about that I think about in the future is that Ring has now gotten to the point, and we're focusing on expanding our skills and capabilities of not only growing through acquisitions, but also growing through organic prospect and development opportunities. And so organically identifying new drilling opportunities that don't come through an acquisition. If you look at acquisitions, they have really a limited margin. So when you buy PDP assets, you're going to bid a PV-10, or a PV-12, or a PV-15, or PV-whatever it is that you're going to bid. Well, that discount rate represents a return on those assets if everything in your analysis turns out to be right, such as your price forecast, and your differentials, and operating costs, and all that kind of stuff.
But when you're organically generating opportunities, now you have the full spectrum, so to speak, of return available to you. It's the easiest, the most profitable way to generate growth for your shareholders. And so we are now entering a new phase where we believe that in 2025 and 2026, you're gonna see an increasing component of organically generated opportunities to add to our tool kit, if you wanna call it that. A&D growth has gotten us to where we are.
Mm.
But now the organization a little bit better. We've got our geoscience and engineering teams now are focused on more than just the A&D. We're also focused on organically generating, and so we'll see how things go. But we are in a great position in 2024 here as we approach the end of 2024. When I look at 2025 and 2026, the potential for, you know, sustainably healthy energy prices and the growth opportunities for this company, I just, I'm just really excited about it.
And I think we are in a great position today, and so I think our shareholders, there's ever a time, especially in light of what's going on in our industry right now with these volatile oil prices, the hit that it has made on the small cap producers like ourselves in terms of our share price. There is no better time to invest in Ring Energy than right now, especially when I looked at the future.
I think I know you've got an earnings call coming up in a few weeks, so we'll reconvene after that. I think one thing that might be good for a future Fireside Chat would be to talk about leveraging the existing asset base to identify organic growth and maybe touch on some of the technology applications to older assets that we touched on earlier in this Fireside Chat. That might be a good topic for a follow-up.
That will be a great topic for a follow-up, and so, yeah, I look forward to that. Jeff, and I gotta tell you, thank you very much for setting this Fireside Chat up. I hope the audience learned a little bit more about Ring Energy, and I hope they are as equally excited about Ring Energy as I am. I know I'm the chairman. I'm supposed to be the biggest cheerleader for this company, but I really believe in the assets. I really believe in the management team and the overall team that we have. Everybody is hitting on all cylinders here at the company, and we're performing very well, and I'm just... I'm really proud to be associated with the entire Ring Energy team.
Paul, thank you very much for your time today.
Hey, thank you.