USAC closes 2022 with significant gains

USA Compression has provided compression services since 1998 and completed its IPO in January 2013. (Photo: USA Compression.)

USA Compression closed out a solid 2022 recently, with gains in revenue, operating income and margins. Its net income for the year nearly tripled to $30.3 million, according to the company’s latest earnings statement.

“Our fourth-quarter results were indicative of the vital importance of natural gas compression within the midstream and broader energy-market value chain. We again experienced sequential-quarter increases in revenues, Adjusted EBITDA, and revenue-generating horsepower, along with continued improvements to pricing,” said Eric D. Long, USA Compression’s president and CEO.

In addition, the company’s 4Q22 results represented a quarterly record for revenue because of improvements to fleet utilization, which exceeded 91% at the end of the quarter, he said.

The company’s fleet horsepower rose to 3.71 million hp, up from 3.69 million hp a year earlier. It had 4,116 revenue generating compression units at the end of 2022, up from 3,942 units a year earlier. The company’s horsepower utilization rose to 88.6%, up from 82.7% a year earlier. The company spent $46.1 million in expansion capital expenditures and $3.7 million on maintenance in 2022.

Fleet horsepower is horsepower for compression units that have been delivered to the company and excludes units on order. As of December 31, 2022, the company had 165,000 large horsepower on order for delivery during 2023. Looking forward to 2023, the company said it expected net income to surge further to between $75 million to $95 million and its distributable cash flow should range from $260 million to $280 million.

USA Compression is a limited partnership whose general partner is owned by Energy Transfer. It is one of the largest providers of natural gas compression services. Its customer base includes producers, processors, gatherers and transporters of natural gas and oil. The company strives to focus on units of 1000 hp or more.