ET Q2 2026 - Preliminary Earnings Alert
Event: Quartr Q2 2026 event Retrieved: 2026-08-04T14:35:00Z Comparison mode: aggressive Scorecard contract: v1 Source status: release=available | financials=release document only | transcript=marked available, not yet read
Consensus scorecard
| Metric / basis | Quartr actual | API Ninjas consensus | Beat/Miss | Beat/Miss % |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Revenue / consolidated revenues | $34,334m | $27,712m | Beat +$6,622m | +23.9% |
| EPS / GAAP diluted per common unit | $0.59 | $0.3798 | Beat +$0.2102 | +55.3% |
Reported results and guidance
| Metric (GAAP unless noted) | Q2 2026 | Q2 2025 | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Revenues | $34,334m | $19,242m | +78.4% |
| Cost of products sold | $26,936m | $13,946m | +93.1% |
| Operating expenses | $1,828m | $1,343m | +36.1% |
| Depreciation, depletion and amortization | $1,575m | $1,384m | +13.8% |
| Selling, general and administrative | $421m | $257m | +63.8% |
| Operating income | $3,574m | $2,309m | +54.8% |
| Interest expense, net of capitalized | $(934)m | $(865)m | +8.0% |
| Income tax expense | $194m | $79m | +145.6% |
| Net income | $2,530m | $1,458m | +73.5% |
| Net income attributable to partners | $2,088m | $1,163m | +79.5% |
| Net income per common unit, diluted | $0.59 | $0.32 | +84.4% |
| Adjusted EBITDA, consolidated (non-GAAP) | $5,066m | $3,866m | +31% |
| Distributable cash flow to partners, as adjusted (non-GAAP) | $2,587m | $1,959m | +32% |
| Quarterly distribution per common unit | $0.3400 | ~$0.3300 | >+3% |
FY2026 guidance updated with the release:
| Metric | New guide | Prior guide |
|---|---|---|
| Adjusted EBITDA (non-GAAP) | $18.8–19.1bn | $18.2–18.6bn |
| Growth capital expenditures | $5.6–5.9bn | — |
- Second-quarter capital spending: growth capex $1.10bn, maintenance capex $307m as stated in the release text.
- Volume records across the system: NGL transportation +13%, NGL exports +25%, crude oil transportation +4%, and midstream gathered volumes +4% all set partnership records; NGL fractionation volumes rose 3%.
- Scorecard recap: revenue beat consensus by 23.9% ($34,334m vs. $27,712m) and GAAP diluted EPS per common unit beat by 55.3% ($0.59 vs. $0.3798).
Key bullish aspects
- Adjusted EBITDA rose 31% to $5,066m and distributable cash flow attributable to partners rose 32% to $2,587m, so the beat is not confined to GAAP or to mark-to-market items.
- Full-year adjusted EBITDA guidance was raised by roughly $0.55bn at the midpoint, to $18.8–19.1bn from $18.2–18.6bn.
- Distribution coverage is wide: $2,587m of distributable cash flow against $1,172m of total distributions to be paid to partners, roughly 2.2x.
- The nineteenth consecutive quarterly distribution increase took the rate to $0.3400 per unit ($1.36 annualized), more than 3% above the prior-year quarter.
- Growth projects are converting to service: the Hugh Brinson Pipeline is in commercial service and expected to flow its full 1.5 Bcf/d Phase I capacity by 1 September 2026, the Mustang Draw I 275 MMcf/d plant entered service in June, and Lone Star Express upgrades added more than 90,000 Bbls/d of Permian NGL takeaway.
- Contracting extends the runway: roughly 300,000 Bbls/d of long-term transportation and/or fractionation agreements on y-grade assets extending into the 2030s, plus a fully subscribed Nederland export expansion adding 240,000 bpd of ethane and 55,000 bpd of LPG capacity.
- Management states no single segment contributed more than one-third of consolidated adjusted EBITDA in the quarter.
Key bearish aspects
- The EPS beat is materially assisted by mark-to-market: the adjusted EBITDA reconciliation removes $396m of unrealized gains on commodity risk management activities, versus $100m removed a year earlier. That roughly $296m year-over-year swing is about $0.09 per diluted unit of the $0.27 increase and is non-cash.
- The revenue increase is overwhelmingly pass-through cost: revenues rose $15,092m while cost of products sold rose $12,990m, so 86% of incremental revenue was absorbed by product cost. Revenue outperformance against consensus is therefore a weaker signal than the EBITDA line.
- Cost growth outran volume growth in the controllable lines: operating expenses rose 36.1% and SG&A rose 63.8% against mid-single-digit to low-double-digit volume gains.
- Interest expense rose to $934m from $865m, and in July the partnership issued $1.75bn of junior subordinated notes due 2057 at 6.550% and 6.700%, well above its historical cost of senior debt.
- Long-term debt is essentially flat at $68,393m versus $68,308m at year-end 2025 while current liabilities rose to $19,858m from $14,955m.
- Income tax expense rose to $194m from $79m and current income tax expense in the DCF reconciliation more than doubled to $119m from $55m.
Key uncertainties
- How much of the raised full-year adjusted EBITDA guide rests on commodity spreads versus contracted fee-based volumes is not broken out in the release.
- The release does not state a segment-level revenue or EBITDA table in the pages reviewed, so the composition of the 31% EBITDA growth across natural gas, NGL, crude, and Sunoco/USAC contributions is not verifiable from this document.
- The $396m of unrealized commodity gains reverses if forward curves move; the release does not disclose the associated position size or tenor.
- Two capital-spending figures appear in the release: $307m of maintenance capex in the narrative for the quarter versus $401m in the consolidated distributable-cash-flow reconciliation; the release does not label which is partnership-only versus consolidated.
- The Desert Southwest expansion is still at the FERC scoping stage, and management says additional natural gas pipeline projects will be announced later this year, so the capital program beyond the $5.6–5.9bn 2026 guide is not yet defined.
- Growth capex of $5.6–5.9bn exceeds the roughly $5.3bn of first-half distributable cash flow attributable to partners annualized against distributions, so funding mix for the program is a live question the release does not address.
Market context
- API Ninjas snapshot: $20.53 on NYSE, volume 3,412,650, retrieved 2026-08-04T14:12:43Z (10:12 a.m. ET, roughly 42 minutes into the regular session). This is a single intraday quote, not a complete session or reaction measurement.
Source limitations
- Every actual above comes from the Quartr release document; Quartr standardized financials for this event are not yet populated.
- API Ninjas supplied no actual or difference fields for this event, so the beat/miss is calculated locally as Quartr actual minus API Ninjas estimate. The API row carried no fiscal year or quarter, so the exact ticker-and-event-date match path was used.
- Energy Transfer does not publish an adjusted or non-GAAP per-unit earnings figure, so GAAP diluted net income per common unit is used per the aggressive-mode fallback. The consensus EPS of $0.3798 is not identified by the provider as to basis; the provider's prior-quarter actual ($0.35 for Q1 2026) is consistent with the GAAP per-unit figure.
- The prior-year quarterly distribution rate is inferred from the release's statement that the current $0.3400 rate is "an increase of more than 3%" versus the second quarter of 2025; the exact prior rate is not printed in the release.
- Quartr marks a transcript as available for this event but it has not been read for this preliminary report; a post-call update will follow.