Home / Transcripts / Ring Energy, Inc. (REI) · October 16, 2024

Ring Energy, Inc. (REI) Earnings Call Transcript

October 16, 2024

NYSE American US Energy Oil, Gas and Consumable Fuels special 39 min

Earnings Call Speaker Segments

Jeffrey Robertson analyst
#1

Fireside chat with Paul McKinney, Ring Energy's Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. Before we begin our 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 home page. 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.

Paul McKinney executive
#2

Yes. 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.

Jeffrey Robertson analyst
#3

Great. Today's discussion, we will refer to one of the slides, I think it's Slide 16 on the most recent corporate presentation deck. 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 the 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 second quarter, and the leverage ratio was about 1.6x. 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 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?

Paul McKinney executive
#4

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. Whatever the issue may be, the fact remains we don't qualify, okay? And so -- but you've also heard me say that we don't want to get large just for the sake of getting larger. Our historical growth and our intentions regarding our future growth are all centered around profitable growth and accretion to our existing shareholders. So 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.

Jeffrey Robertson analyst
#5

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?

Paul McKinney executive
#6

Yes, real simple. Adding more producing assets to our portfolio adds more PV10 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 to manage our debt levels so that the full strength of the balance sheet can be accessible to the management when opportunities actually arrive.

Jeffrey Robertson analyst
#7

So it's one way to think about it, Paul, but 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?

Paul McKinney executive
#8

Absolutely. Okay. So when you think about that in the combination, the whole goal through acquisitions and managing your balance sheet and increasing the strength of the balance sheet of having more collateral to put against the loans you borrow from the bank to acquire those assets. So you got to buy them right and you got to 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? When the leverage ratio is the debt with respect to the trailing 12 months of EBITDA. And so you've got to structure the deal right, you got to buy the deal right, and you also need to be acquiring the right type of assets to make all [indiscernible].

Jeffrey Robertson analyst
#9

When you think about the 3 acquisitions 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 3 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 2 years ago?

Paul McKinney executive
#10

We are still looking for certain asset characteristics in everything we do. Okay. And so the size may not [indiscernible] 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.

Jeffrey Robertson analyst
#11

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?

Paul McKinney executive
#12

Yes. So the appropriate funding mix centers around accretion to our existing stock, 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 properly grow the company. A lot easier said than done, especially in today's market.

Jeffrey Robertson analyst
#13

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. In the context of capital intensity, which gets a lot of talk, how do conventional assets help you manage Ring's capital intensity?

Paul McKinney executive
#14

Yes. 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 shorter lives. But the conventional assets generally have shallower declines, which lead to longer ones. 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.

Jeffrey Robertson analyst
#15

The industry, Paul, is obviously focused towards unconventional assets for the last, going on 20 years, I guess, since the Haynesville Shale really took off and the Barnett before that. So there's a lot of focus on technology improvements for unconventional reservoirs. 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?

Paul McKinney executive
#16

Yes. So describing that in a way that's meaningful is 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 technology 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 to apply, okay? So a good example of that is the now well-established San Andres horizontal oil play. And San Andres is a conventional reservoir that historically was limited in terms of 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 apply 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 discovered uneconomic hydrocarbon resource. And so this is going to be the new trend. 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's uneconomic. Well today, with today's technology, many of those resources can now be classified as reserves because I 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 going to have to look for other places to grow. And this is where the industry is going to go. They're going to follow suit what we've been doing now for the last 4 years.

Jeffrey Robertson analyst
#17

Can you talk about incremental returns. So you obviously buy an asset with the notion of 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?

Paul McKinney executive
#18

Yes. So every decision we make in 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. 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 allocating our capital to the projects that have the highest returns. And so everything in our company is focused about 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.

Jeffrey Robertson analyst
#19

There's been a lot of talk in the unconventional place, 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?

Paul McKinney executive
#20

Yes. 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 have shallower depths. We don't require the same rigs with the higher horsepower that are necessary for the Delaware and Midland Basin because they're at much bigger 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 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 a 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.

Jeffrey Robertson analyst
#21

In your latest corporate presentation, you put a slide in that talks about the Central Basin Platform, and it basically says that the Central Basin Platform is the remaining underexplored opportunity in the shale era in the Permian Basin. You mentioned also, Paul, that -- and 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. Why do you believe the Central Basin platform in the Northwest shelf, where you operate, are target-rich environments for your existing strategy?

Paul McKinney executive
#22

Yes. And so these areas, the Central Basin platform, the southern portion of the Northwest Shelf have not had the industry focus nor the capital spending levels of the Delaware and Midland basin has had for the past decade or more. These areas are also more characterized by conventional assets with zones that fallen into category we've been discussing, zones that can benefit considerably from the application of modern drilling and completion technology. And so we 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 has been solely focused on the 2 big basins, that has left the Central Basin Platform and North West Shelf available for us to acquire and continue to apply our strategy [indiscernible].

Jeffrey Robertson analyst
#23

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?

Paul McKinney executive
#24

That's the way we've been thinking about it. We came to Ring in the fourth quarter of 2020. We looked at what was going on in the industry and where are the opportunities? Where was the really high entry cost 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 the shareholders. So the overall strategy of the previous management team is not a whole lot different from ours. A very similar strategy, we've just taken it to another level.

Jeffrey Robertson analyst
#25

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 both on oil but also on natural gas. 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?

Paul McKinney executive
#26

Yes, I'll have to get you to define meaningful, but some limitations, but they're more about improving [Technical Difficulty] 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 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 the pumping unit. And so what we find is that in some areas, electricity delivery capacity is not quite what we need. So we've got to upgrade the electrical system, putting bigger transformers and all that kind of stuff. The other thing is we found that we needed to enhance the saltwater disposal. We like to own our saltwater disposal system 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 2 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 the condition so that we can generate the proper rheologies with our fracking rigs 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 20s, 30s and 40s, 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 our 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.

Jeffrey Robertson analyst
#27

One of the things you point out on the slide that I talked about, which is Slide 16 that we talked a little bit about 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 whatever their new company is?

Paul McKinney executive
#28

Yes, I do. And I believe we've already seen this with a large PDP 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 has 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 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 going to play very well into our strategy associated with growth.

Jeffrey Robertson analyst
#29

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?

Paul McKinney executive
#30

Yes. We've seen that already occur, right? And so APA Corporation has already announced the amount of money they sold their assets for, which in my analysis is on the high end. I think we set a new high watermark for some of the assets. I hope that the rest of the industry doesn't believe that they'll achieve those types of levels. And so we'll see. 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 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.

Jeffrey Robertson analyst
#31

Well, I guess for you 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 to complement what you see in the acquisition market.

Paul McKinney executive
#32

Yes, they really have. We're really proud of the progress we've made. And if you go back to the presentation materials on Page 4, I think on the most recent presentation we have out there, kind of summarize 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 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 3 years, the last 2 transactions, I think the last 3 transactions have demonstrated what this management team is capable of.

Jeffrey Robertson analyst
#33

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 Rings' 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. How do you think about free cash flow and the leverage threshold that Ring would need to achieve before the Board can really consider some sort of plan to return cash?

Paul McKinney executive
#34

Yes, so a leverage ratio comfortably below 1 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 do you manage that balance sheet. And so like we said, growth of growth's sake is a failed strategy, but growth with a properly managed and improving balance sheet is a demonstration of a healthy company. And so going back to your question that you asked, yes, the leverage ratio going to need to be comfortably below 1. But you also got to remember, there's other things to that. The size and scale of the balance sheet or the company have 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 the size and scale of the company and the balance sheet are so important. So it's basically [indiscernible].

Jeffrey Robertson analyst
#35

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?

Paul McKinney executive
#36

Yes. So you're touching on things that are very intertwined, so to speak. In other words, they all depend on each other. So reducing the investment rate is needed to maintain production and liquidity is very important and leads to our ability to return cash to stockholders, okay? So this is why we are and we'll 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 cost 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 industry to do so.

Jeffrey Robertson analyst
#37

I'd like to touch on budgeting. I can imagine Ring like -- most E&P companies are probably in some part of their 2025 budget cycle. So I don't want to ask for a specific number because 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 here recently over the last couple of months, a volatile commodity price outlook?

Paul McKinney executive
#38

Yes. So no, we have not put our budget together for 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 we talked in the past about breakeven costs. And so it's a really 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 breakeven costs were around $25. Since that time, we've been in an inflationary environment where the cost of goods and services and drilling wells have come up. And so the breakeven cost for our investments are more around $30 or $35, 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 breakeven costs for drilling the wells. And so there's other costs. You've got salaries and G&A, you've got interest expense on our loans. And so when you look at the total cost of running the organization and you look at your goals that you set for debt repayment, there comes a price that the cash flow generation and the ability to pay down debt compete for capital, okay? And so right now, that threshold for us and our organization, if you get below $65 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, with respect to budgeting, I like to use $70 to $80, $85, maybe as high as $90, I don't know if we'll see $90 any time soon. But $70, we can comfortably grow the company and meet or exceed our debt repayment goals. Now when you fall below $70, then you start getting a little concerned. But again, that will be on a sustained basis. And so that kind of -- I hope that answers your question. It kind of puts a little bit of perspective as to where we are. Interest expense right now is a very large item when you look at our monthly and quarterly expenses and we want to get that interest expense paid down. And so that -- and riding 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. So we -- when oil prices fall to that $65 level, we'll start reallocating our free cash flow towards improving the balance sheet, and we'll worry less about production growth in times like that.

Jeffrey Robertson analyst
#39

I guess as a follow-up to that, 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.

Paul McKinney executive
#40

Yes. 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 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 or 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 don't want to allocate too large a portion, but it does allow for the explosive growth opportunities. 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're 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're returning cash to shareholders. By focusing on free cash flow generation, it allows you to achieve all of those. And so it really doesn't 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 will be the same strategy that carries us into a very healthy, competitive and sustainable returns to shareholders.

Jeffrey Robertson analyst
#41

It should be a higher quality problem to have as you get bigger?

Paul McKinney executive
#42

Absolutely.

Jeffrey Robertson analyst
#43

Maybe just -- 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 just to summarize for us where you think Ring is in that evolution of 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?

Paul McKinney executive
#44

Yes. And so the first thing I'll tell you is, again, go back to Page 4 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 got to find the right deal. You've got to have a discipline not to get caught up in the fury of the competition and pay more for assets than we should. So you got to know when to hold them and you got to know when to fold them, so to speak, right? And so 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 Ring. So far this year, we haven't been able to bring down another profitable acquisition that hasn't been from a 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 PV10 or PV12 or PV15 or 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. So we are now entering a new phase where we believe that in 2025 or 2026, you're going to see an increasing component of organically generated opportunities to add to our toolkit, if you want to call it that. A&D growth has gotten us to where we are, but now the organization is a little bit better. We've got our geoscience and engineering teams now are focused on more than just A&D, they're also focused on organically generating and so we'll see how things go. But we are in a great position here as we approach the end of 2024. When I look at 2025 and 2026, the potential for sustainably healthy energy prices and the growth opportunities for this company, 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 and the hit 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 look at the future.

Jeffrey Robertson analyst
#45

Well, I think, I know you've got an earnings call coming up in a few weeks, so we'll reconvene after that. But 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. So that might be a good topic for a follow-up.

Paul McKinney executive
#46

That will be a great topic for a follow-up. So yes, I look forward to that, jeff. And I got to 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 really proud to be associated with the entire Ring Energy team.

Jeffrey Robertson analyst
#47

Paul, thank you very much for your time today.

Paul McKinney executive
#48

Thank you.

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