ET

Emergency Declaration: The U.S. Department of Transportation declared an emergency for New York, New Jersey, Delaware, and Pennsylvania due to a heating fuel storage facility outage, which threatened propane deliveries during severe cold weather.

Regulatory Waivers: The declaration allowed drivers to exceed rest regulations while distributing propane, following state-level waivers from New Jersey and Pennsylvania to prevent heating fuel distribution disruptions and potential price spikes.

Cause of Disruption: The outage was caused by an electrical failure at Energy Transfer's Marcus Hook terminal, which halted propane loading for three days and led to a force majeure declaration.

Operational Limitations: Propane loading is now limited to 12 hours per day, causing increased wait times for trucks, whereas the facility typically operates 24/7 with around 200 trucks picking up propane daily.

Energy Transfer's Growth Potential: Energy Transfer is positioned to benefit from the AI boom with significant growth projects, including two major pipeline initiatives in the Permian Basin, and offers an attractive 8% yield with plans for annual distribution increases.

Enterprise Products Partners' Stability: Enterprise Products Partners is known for its consistent performance and conservative management, having raised its distribution for 27 consecutive years, and focuses on fee-based activities to minimize exposure to commodity price fluctuations.

Valuation Comparison: Energy Transfer is currently trading at a lower valuation (EV/EBITDA of 7.6) compared to Enterprise Products Partners (9.7), making it a potentially more attractive investment despite its recent underperformance.

Analyst Recommendations: While both stocks are considered attractive for 2026, the author favors Energy Transfer due to its strong foundation and growth opportunities, although it was not included in the Motley Fool's latest top stock recommendations.