Topic: How To Invest

Pat: Can you give me your thoughts on Eagle Rock Energy Partners? Is their $1.64 annual dividend sustainable? At a yield of over 30%, this sounds too good to be true. Perhaps it is. Thanks.

Article Excerpt

Eagle Rock Energy Partners LP, $5.50, symbol EROC on Nasdaq (Shares outstanding: 55.7 million; Market cap: $306.4 million), is a limited partnership that operates in the upstream, midstream and royalty-fee segments of the U.S. oil and natural gas industry. Eagle Rock produces and explores for natural gas through its upstream business. In turn, midstream involves gathering, compressing, treating, processing and transporting the gas. Eagle Rock also buys and manages royalty interests, either directly or by investing in other partnerships. Eagle Rock is a master limited partnership. As such, it is publicly traded and at least 90% of its cash flow must come from real estate or natural resources. Limited partnerships do not pay income tax, and are required to distribute their “available cash” to unitholders. Eagle Rock first sold units to the public at $19 each, and began trading on Nasdaq in October 2006. Eagle Rock’s upstream business has properties in four U.S. natural-gas producing regions: southern Alabama, east Texas, south Texas…