Brookfield Infrastructure Partners (NYSE:BIP) is an infrastructure YieldCo that I believe does not cover its distributions and trades at an unjustifiably high multiple of NAV. Simply right-sizing the multiple implies approximately 65% downside. Penalizing the partnership for not covering distributions would imply a discount to that.

BIP owns infrastructure assets largely through private funds managed by its sponsor, Brookfield Asset Management (BAM). The LP is structured to avoid being regulated under the Investment Company Act of 1940. Part of the requirements for the regulatory exemption is that management present the partnership as an operating company. This is why BIP is referred to as a company rather than a fund or investment company.

Despite the structure and language, the sole value of the partnerships is its investments, which are carried on the balance sheet at what management believes to be fair value. As of 2Q23, I calculated partnership capital divided by units outstanding led to a NAV of $11.40 per unit, which is the same as Yahoo Finance lists as the book value per share.

BIP uses FFO, a proprietary metric, as a proxy for cash flow to determine distributions to limited partners. I believe FFO significantly overstates cash available to the partnership for distributions. I illustrate why below. BIP includes its proportion of FFO from equity-accounted investments instead of dividends received from them.

The table shows the proportional contribution to FFO from consolidated and equity-accounted investments along with BIP's FFO payout ratio.

Over the period shown, FFO from equity-accounted investments have ranged from 42% to 44% of the total. The payout ratio has averaged 73% over the same period. BIP reports distributions received from equity-accounted investments, so we can compare it with proportional FFO reported. The table below shows the comparison.

SEC filings indicate that over the period shown BIP has on average, collected dividends of only 34% of FFO recorded. I think 2022 was an outlier as it includes asset sales.

The math is this: for every $1 off FFO booked, BIP paid out $0.73 but only collected $0.34. I believe that this mismatch between bookings and collections leads to overpayment of distributions.

If we recreate BIP's payout swapping distributions received for proportional FFO, the payout looks like this.

I believe this is a more accurate representation because it uses actual cash received rather than a conceptual proportion. It indicates that over the period shown, BIP paid out 100% of the cash available, which I think is unsustainable.

Ideally, management would disclose distributions received from investments, but they do not. The next best thing is to use a proportional cash flow metric that accounts for distributions received from equity-accounted investments, which is how most YieldCo distribution coverage models are constructed. I provide the proportional payout ratio. It is roughly equivalent to BIP's FFO payout - it includes movements of working capital and FFO doesn't.

The table below shows my estimate of the payout ratio. I include BIP's FFO payout ratio for comparative purposes.

Using proportionate cash flow, BIP has never covered distributions. My estimates show that BIP's average payout has been 144% over the period shown. To put this in context, the table below shows the payout for several other YieldCo's using the same metric.

For each of the entities above, I calculated payout as a percentage of cash flow from operations. To make the entities comparable to BIP, I added dividends received. Most companies include dividends/distributions received as a cash flow from investing; BIP includes it in cash flow from operations.

Note that BIP owns Cheniere Energy Partners (CQP) and Dalrymple Bay Infrastructure - DBI.AX -, which are both publicly traded. Both are YieldCos with payouts averaging 56% in 2022. Conceptually, BIP should not have a higher payout than the entities it owns.

Overall, the comparison shows that BIP's payout is far in excess of other YieldCos, and presumably, what is sustainable.

Not only is BIP's payout ratio far in excess of comparable companies, so is its valuation. BIP is a valuation anomaly with infrastructure investment vehicles. The table below shows several comparable entities based on valuation relative to NAV.

10 of 11 comparable entities shown trade at a discount to NAV. BIP clearly trades at the highest premium by a wide margin.

BIP investors have become accustomed to looking at yield and distribution growth to the exclusion of NAV. This was not always the case. Early in its history as a publicly traded entity, BIP was regularly valued on the basis of NAV.

My sense is that investors think about BIP as a safe dividend play, almost analogous to fixed income. That was understandable in the post-GFC as interest rates trended toward zero and asset values only seemed to increase. However, the world is different now. Investors have many more income choices than in the recent past. I believe that one consequence of that will be increased scrutiny of YieldCos and BIP is an anomaly hiding in plain sight.

This article was written by

Analyst’s Disclosure: I/we have a beneficial short position in the shares of BIP either through stock ownership, options, or other derivatives. I wrote this article myself, and it expresses my own opinions. I am not receiving compensation for it. I have no business relationship with any company whose stock is mentioned in this article.

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