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Transcript
OP
Operator
Operator
Good morning, and welcome to Permian Resources Corporation conference call to discuss its fourth quarter and full year 2025 earnings. Today's call is being recorded. A replay of the call will be accessible until 03/13/2026 by dialing (888) 660-6264 and entering the replay access code 23999, or by visiting the company's website at www.permianres.com. At this time, I will turn the call over to Hays Mabry, Permian Resources Corporation Vice President of Investor Relations, for opening remarks. Please go ahead.
HM
Hays Mabry
Management
On the call today are Will Hickey and James Walter, our Chief Executive Officers, and Guy Oliphint, our Chief Financial Officer. Many of the comments during this call are forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties that could affect our actual results, and are discussed in more detail in our filings with the SEC. We may also refer to non-GAAP financial measures. For any non-GAAP measure we use, a reconciliation to the nearest corresponding GAAP measure can be found in our earnings release or presentation. With that, I will turn the call over to Will Hickey, Co-CEO.
WH
William M. Hickey
Management
Thanks, Hays. We are excited to discuss our fourth quarter results as well as our 2026 plan this morning. We set records across every key operational metric in Q4, including our highest oil production, lowest D&C cost per foot, and lowest controllable cash cost in Permian Resources Corporation history. Our strong Q4 performance capped off an excellent 2025 with free cash flow per share increasing 18% year-over-year to $1.94 per share. This performance was achieved alongside meaningful debt reduction, demonstrating the strength and consistency of our core operations. We believe 2025 represents a highly repeatable year and a clear demonstration of the strength of our business. As we look to 2026, our focus remains the same: maximize shareholder value through disciplined execution of our highly capital efficient Delaware Basin program. We are proud to lay out a 2026 plan that we expect will continue to drive free cash flow per share growth going forward. Moving into quarterly results, Q4 production exceeded expectations with oil production of 188,600 barrels of oil per day and total production of 401,500 barrels of oil equivalent per day. Our D&C team continued to execute at a high level, reducing D&C cost per foot to $700, resulting in $481,000,000 of cash CapEx for the quarter and $1,970,000,000 for the year. In addition, we delivered leading cash costs supporting strong margins with Q4 LOE of $5.26 per BOE, cash G&A of $0.80 per BOE, and GP&T of $1.18 per BOE. Strong production results paired with low cash costs and CapEx resulted in adjusted operating cash flow of $884,000,000 and adjusted free cash flow of $403,000,000. Lastly, I want to highlight we are increasing our 2026 quarterly base dividend to $0.16 per share, a 7% increase. Since inception in 2022, Permian Resources Corporation has grown its quarterly base…
JW
James H. Walter
Management
Thanks, Will. Turning to slide seven, we wanted to highlight the continued success of our acquisition strategy. During Q4, we closed on approximately 140 transactions totaling $240,000,000. This particular set of acquisitions was heavily inventory-weighted and added 7,700 net acres, 1,300 net royalty acres, and approximately 70 net locations at attractive valuations. The Q4 acquisitions capped off a great 2025 M&A program; our confidence in continuing to execute on the strategy going forward is as high as ever. We completed approximately $1,100,000,000 of acquisitions during the year, adding about 250 locations and 13,000 BOE per day within our existing operating areas. These 700 acquisitions consist of a large asset deal from Apache in New Mexico, several medium-sized bolt-on acquisitions, and a substantial ground game that totaled over 675 smaller transactions. For the third consecutive year, Permian Resources Corporation acquired more inventory than we drilled during the year, both increasing our inventory lives and enhancing the quality of our go-forward plan. In addition to the 250 high rate of return locations that Permian Resources Corporation acquired through the year, Permian Resources Corporation also added another 200 locations through organic inventory expansion. We believe that our local presence in Midland and our peer-leading cost structure in the Delaware provide a competitive advantage as we pursue transactions that create long-term value for shareholders. Over the next 12 to 24 months, we are confident in our ability to continue to find attractive deals, drive value for investors, and make our business better—just like we have the last ten years. To slide nine. We are excited to discuss our 2026 plan, which is focused on maximizing returns and free cash flow per share through consistent, thoughtful capital allocation and low-cost execution. This plan is a product of significant collaboration across the organization; we want to…
WH
William M. Hickey
Management
Thank you for tuning in today, and I will turn it back to the operator for Q&A.
OP
Operator
Operator
Thank you. The question and answer session will be conducted electronically. If you would like to ask a question, please do so by pressing the star, then the number one, on your telephone keypad. If you would like to withdraw your question, please press the pound key. Your first question comes from Kevin McCurdy with Pickering Energy Partners. Please go ahead.
KM
Kevin Moreland McCurdy
Analyst · Pickering Energy Partners. Please go ahead
Hey, great. Thank you for taking my question. Maybe a strategy question to start. You have had a relentless and very successful focus on free cash flow per share growth over the past few years. But whereas your free cash flow focus has led you to grow volumes, a lot of your peers are trying to grow free cash flow with flat or even declining volumes. What do you think you are doing right that others are missing, or is this just kind of an outcome of inventory quality? And maybe a follow-up on capital allocation. You have a lot of free cash flow coming your way in 2026. The balance sheet is in a great position. Can you talk about how you are thinking about the various uses of cash this year?
WH
William M. Hickey
Management
Yeah. I mean, I think there are definitely different ways to grow free cash flow per share. You can kind of grow it via the numerator, which has largely been our strategy—kind of both organic and inorganic free cash flow growth over the last couple of years. And you can also grow it through the denominator. I think that is probably a different business model than we have pursued, as you outlined, but I do not think that makes it wrong. I think it reflects, yeah, like you said, I think an opportunity set, an inventory quality, and really just the maturity of our business.
JW
James H. Walter
Management
I think a lot of businesses that are kind of shifting to a reduce-the-denominator buyback-share strategy are typically more mature businesses and more mature basins. And I would say for us, we are fortunate. I think we are in the most exciting oil basin in North America that has a ton of running room. So you have seen us do more free cash flow per share growth in terms of organic growth and growth through acquisitions. And that has been a really good recipe for us. And I think we are really fortunate that the opportunity set for the next few years feels as good or better than it has been the last couple. On capital allocation, I think we had a great slide in our deck, slide 16. And I think, really, for sure, we have got kind of free cash flow coming in. And for us, our plan is to use every tool we have got in the toolkit kind of as the opportunity persists. I think capital allocation is something we really pride ourselves on. I think we have done a great job of that the past decade. And look, we are going to allocate capital to the opportunities in front of us that we think will drive the greatest return over the long term. Obviously, base dividend is first and foremost, and we are proud of our track record of continuing to grow that dividend year in and year out. And then beyond that, it is going to really depend on the opportunity set. I think if we have opportunities for really attractive accretive acquisitions, we will pursue those to the best of our ability. And if we do not, I think we are always excited to accrue cash to the balance sheet because we know this is a cyclical business. And I think paying down debt and saving dollars for the future has been a great return for us in the past. And, finally, when dislocations exist, we are excited to buy back shares. Obviously, we leaned in heavily for a week or two in April and have not had a lot of opportunities there since then. But for us, I think capital allocation really is all of the above, and we do not see any need to kind of limit or restrict ourselves going forward.
OP
Operator
Operator
Your next question comes from Neal Dingmann with William Blair. Please go ahead.
ND
Neal Dingmann
Analyst · William Blair. Please go ahead
Good morning, guys. Nice quarter. James, my question sticking with this a little bit is on the ground game specifically. Just curious how active you all believe you can continue to be on ground game and maybe just M&A in general given a couple things. One, it is pretty notable your peers out there paying record prices for leases, and even the ABS market continues to heat up. So it certainly seems to be a bit of a seller's market out there. You seem to have confidence both on ground game and just external growth overall. Would love to hear where that confidence comes from. And then my second question is on potential for ancillary businesses. Specifically, you have talked in the past—you have got a fair amount of surface acreage. There is potential for you and some other guys in the basin for power deals. And how are you looking at either things like lithium extraction or other byproducts of your produced water?
JW
James H. Walter
Management
Yeah. In our ground game, the small blocking and tackling stuff has been remarkably consistent for a decade. I think, if anything, as we have gotten the larger position we have today, we have gotten kind of our team in place. I think the prospects are better, and 2025 is probably our best year ever from a ground game perspective. So that feels really good. I think a lot of these deals that we are doing are kind of less subject to market pricing and fluctuations. Think about the ground game and most of the bolt-ons that we have done. Those are kind of one-off negotiated deals that were sourced through relationships we have in Midland, industry partners, relationships we have in New Mexico that go back the better part of a decade. So I think we have been fortunate to see that those have been less price sensitive, and we have been able to find a lot of good values. And look, we are paying real prices for high-quality assets—that has always been our business model—but we are definitely still seeing opportunities that make a lot of sense and I think are more insulated from market fluctuations. With regards to ABS changes in markets, we have been pursuing inventory-weighted deals kind of the entirety of our existence. We have stayed away from assets that were a larger percentage of production, higher decline, things like that. So I think for us, we have not seen a lot of pressure from the ABS market on the type of acquisitions we would like to buy just because we are pursuing more inventory-weighted deals.
WH
William M. Hickey
Management
On ancillary businesses, we have said in the past, we own 25,000 surface acres across the Delaware Basin. The majority of that is in Reeves County on the Texas side of the basin, and we have got a few kind of blockier big chunks that I think are in pretty opportunistic spots with respect to power generation to the extent we wanted to pursue it. I am by no means messaging that this is near term or something that you should hear us announce in the coming quarters, but it is something that we are exploring—what that market could look like and trying to better understand it. There are absolutely data centers that are coming to West Texas on ranches nearby ours. So I think we will get to see a good case study for the commerciality of what that looks like. But for us, it is just a balance. The surface acres are also very key to our day-to-day oil and gas operations. We have got water wells on them, SWDs on them, recycling pits on them, and we drive them every day. So we are trying to balance the value proposition of some sort of monetization or partnership as compared to just the day-to-day leveraging it to reduce our cost structure on the upstream assets.
OP
Operator
Operator
Your next question comes from John Freeman with Raymond James. Go ahead, John.
JF
John Christopher Freeman
Analyst · Raymond James. Go ahead, John
Thanks. Good morning, guys. Given the continued cost reductions that you all continue to see, obviously from a return perspective, you all could always choose to flex activity higher. When you are going through the budgeting process, is there a reinvestment rate that you are targeting when setting the budget, and what impact does the geopolitical-driven volatility we have seen in oil this year play into that thought process?
JW
James H. Walter
Management
Yeah. I would say we do not target a specific reinvestment rate. I think there are a lot of things that factor in, and macro is certainly one of them. We have said this a lot in the past: we are typically focused on growing production in an environment where we see free cash flow accretion in a 12 to 18 month period. So you need wells that are very quick payouts, high returning. I think you could argue we are in that environment today, but we are conscious of the macro environment. We had a risk as we headed into 2026 that feels a little better today than it did, that we could be in a meaningfully oversupplied market. So even with a widget like we have that checks a lot of our criteria, it has felt prudent as we headed into planning for 2026 to be cautious on growth. Until we have more certainty in the macro and longer term oil prices that are stable and higher, we have chosen to hold off on that growth. But you are right—we have got the inventory base and the widgets that would justify growth, but we are being patient knowing that time will come.
JF
John Christopher Freeman
Analyst · Raymond James. Go ahead, John
Great. And my follow-up: you all added 200 locations last year through organic inventory expansion. It has been topical with some of your Permian peers talking about increased exploration efforts, looking at some new benches or areas. Anything else that you are looking at that has you intrigued right now on newer areas or benches?
WH
William M. Hickey
Management
I would say most—if you want to use the word exploration, that may be a little bit of a stretch—but most exploration we do is better understanding what we have up hole and down hole within the 4,000 foot column that is the Delaware Basin. Our development plan in 2024–2025, and what will be our development plan for 2026, has been very consistent: developing Bone Springs down through the Wolfcamp XY or top of the Wolfcamp, and that is about it. We have added some Avalon and deeper Wolfcamp to our development plans based on offsets. That is the type of exploration that we are doing. Given how vast our position is today, and that we feel good about the existing inventory quality and duration, it is more about what we have on our existing footprint. So when you think about the organic additions of inventory on slide eight, that is what that was. As you move further north away from the state line, we did not typically take credit for Avalon. We watched other operators add Avalon. We added it to a few of our development plans very successfully and have added Avalon to the inventory stack. Same thing with the Wolfcamp D or C—whatever nomenclature you may use.
OP
Operator
Operator
We now have a question from Scott Hanold with RBC Capital Markets. Please go ahead.
SH
Scott Michael Hanold
Analyst · RBC Capital Markets. Please go ahead
Yeah. Thanks. Good morning. On consistent well performance—it is impressive and helps drive things forward better than anticipated. A big part of that is how you guys have really reduced D&C cost quite a bit over the last couple of years. Can you give us a sense of additional levers you can pull? Can you continue to move that D&C cost per foot down? And, agnostic to wholesale service costing, if you want to add commentary there, please do.
WH
William M. Hickey
Management
If you think about how we got here, it was a tremendous amount of progress on cutting days on the drilling side, and then riding the completion efficiencies that the whole industry has picked up as we have gone from single-well to zipper to simul-frac and leveraging recycled water. Going forward, I think there is more juice to squeeze on the cost side on the drilling side of the business. Given where our cost structure is in the Delaware, where we look for someone to chase is typically Midland Basin operators. If we are going to be at $6.75 per foot in the Delaware, then there is a $100+ per foot delta between our well cost and Midland Basin well cost. The biggest delta is on the drilling side. If we average, call it, 13 days spud to rig release on a two-mile well, Midland Basin is five-plus days faster than that, and at a $100,000 to $125,000 a day spread rate, that is another $500,000–$700,000 a well we could go get. So that is what we are focused on. We cut drilling times 6% year-over-year; last year, even more. We have a track record of doing it. It is an all-of-the-above approach. No silver bullet, but if I had to pick one, it is reducing days on the drilling side, which likely means increased ROP in the lateral.
SH
Scott Michael Hanold
Analyst · RBC Capital Markets. Please go ahead
Got it. Thanks for that. My follow-up question is on M&A. Can you give us a sense of what you are seeing in the M&A market in terms of ground game and larger stuff right now? And I am really interested in state and federal lease sales—what is your expectation there, and how competitive is that? Do lease sales present a better opportunity, or are those much more competitive versus ground-based returns?
JW
James H. Walter
Management
Those are great questions. On deal pipeline in general, it feels really strong. Our ground game feels like it is building momentum. The opportunity set is widening, growing, and accelerating, not shrinking. It really feels sustainable for the next handful of years at a minimum. We are seeing the good $500,000,000 to $1,000,000,000 assets like what we bought with Oxy’s Beryl Draw, Apache’s New Mexico exit—we see a great pipeline to those. We are starting to hear rumors and see signs of larger packages coming. There has been a ton of consolidation in the Delaware and the Permian more broadly. We may be on the front end of larger companies who have been consolidators having some divestitures that make sense on the backside. Historically, the largest companies consolidate, and a deconsolidation wave comes a few years later. We had not seen much of that post-COVID. It does feel like we could be entering a phase of that over the next couple years, which only adds to the opportunity set. With regard to federal lease sales, it is great that the administration has been pushing those lease sales out. We think that is good for the country and the industry. Historically, those lease sales are really competitive—anyone can bid online—so more often than not, they tend to be more expensive than most acquisitions we look at. As a result, we have not been as competitive there as in others. We have bought things over the last seven or eight years in New Mexico state, Texas state, and federal lease sales when we had an edge—a strategic or information advantage—which does not apply to all of them. We look at them and participate when we have that edge, but they tend to be pretty competitive.
OP
Operator
Operator
Your next question comes from Zach Parham with JPMorgan. Please go ahead.
ZP
Zach Parham
Analyst · JPMorgan. Please go ahead
Question. James, you mentioned this in your prepared remarks, and it is also in the slide deck, but you have a well cume plot comparing the last few years. And 2026 expectations are flattish to slightly up on a lateral-foot adjusted basis. Can you talk about what is driving that expectation for slightly better productivity year-over-year? Is that different than what we are seeing across the industry? And as a follow-up, you mentioned drilling the longest lateral in company history in 4Q, around 17,000 feet. Is that something you are considering doing more of, and can that help drive costs lower?
WH
William M. Hickey
Management
I would start with, Zach, we are not that good at—let us call it flat. Visually, if you put them all on top of each other, it is messy. And we are not so good that we can dial it in within half a percent. But to your general question, this is what we have been saying since 2023: we have a very consistent development plan where we co-develop all benches that need to be co-developed and we are developing those same benches methodically across our position. So 2025 was no different than 2024, and 2026 is no different than 2025. And 2027 will be no different than 2026. It is a testament to a consistent development methodology, an inventory position that allows us to do it, and an M&A machine that continues to replenish the top quartile in a really sustainable way. That consistency underpins our free cash flow per share growth—holding well productivity flat while cutting costs more than oil prices hurt you. On extra-long laterals, a couple of years ago I said two miles is the optimal length in the Delaware Basin for reasons like total fluid volumes and flowing back three miles’ worth of fluid up five-and-a-half-inch casing delaying barrels in a way that offsets D&C savings. Conceptually true, but probably not perfectly true. The optimal lateral length may be two and a half now. As we develop our position, if we have a four-mile fairway, we will drill two two-mile wells. Five-mile fairway, two two-and-a-half-mile wells. Six-mile fairway, it is a debate: two three-milers or three two-milers. We have proven we can drill two-, three-, and even three-and-a-half-mile wells. The question is what generates the highest rate of return. You get dollar-per-foot savings on one end but can delay peak production on the other. At that point, it is a math problem.
OP
Operator
Operator
Thank you. You now have a question from Derrick Whitfield with Texas Capital. Please go ahead.
DW
Derrick Whitfield
Analyst · Texas Capital. Please go ahead
Good morning all, and congrats on an exceptional year-end. With my questions, I wanted to lean in on the consistency of well performance you highlight on slide 10—it has been remarkably consistent over the last three years and a clear standout. As you look forward in time, how comfortable are you in continuing to generate that level of productivity? It feels like the depth there is good for five years or so. And as a follow-up, while acknowledging you are not highlighting surfactants or driver-based production optimization on today’s call, could you speak to where you are in assessing its potential positive impact to production?
WH
William M. Hickey
Management
I think that is right. I can say with real confidence that for the next four to five years, this is what you should expect to see. Past that, I do not really know exactly what the world looks like—what other benches we are adding, what the M&A machine gins up once you get past the end of the decade. But as we build out specific schedules and work with our planning team, we can continue to maintain this for quite some time. On production optimization, we have tried mixes of surfactants and acids on existing producing wells, typically around first ESP failures. Results are mixed. Some have been wildly successful—doubling or tripling the existing production rate; some have a muted response. I would lump surfactants—bringing back common fracture-side surfactant from 2017–2018 with new tech today—along with things like lightweight proppant. Five to ten years ago people were pumping man-made lightweight proppants; now with pet coke and other tests, there is a big lightweight proppant push. I would even throw EOR in that bucket. There is more focus on increasing recoveries and productivity than ever. I am not willing to pick the winner, but I am confident there will be big wins quickly adopted across the industry. For companies like Permian Resources Corporation with great assets in great basins, it will be a big tailwind. The last three or four years saw huge effort cutting cost out of the system. I would not be surprised if the next three or four years is an equal effort on adding barrels—which can be a much bigger difference than cutting costs in the long term.
OP
Operator
Operator
We now have a question from Neil Mehta with Goldman Sachs. Neil, please go ahead.
NM
Neil Singhvi Mehta
Analyst · Goldman Sachs. Neil, please go ahead
Yeah. Good morning, Will, Guy, James. Question on the gas macro in the Permian. On slide six you talk about how you have been managing through your gas marketing portfolio and have mitigated a lot of the near-term local price risk. Two questions: What is your perspective on how Waha evolves over the next couple of years? And how are you managing through this period of commodity softness until we get to the other side? And as a follow-up, on slide 12, I like the free cash flow per share framework. The biggest risk with a near-term FCF/share framework is underinvestment. How do you manage the business on this framework over the long term, and what are the pitfalls?
JW
James H. Walter
Management
Sure. This year, as forward curves indicate and broader consensus would as well, there is potential for challenges over the course of 2026. It depends how the winter finishes up and what weather and interruptions—planned and unplanned—look like through the year. It could be a bumpy road. As you get into 2027 and beyond, without an unexpected step change in Permian gas growth, we could be close to having the right pipeline takeaway capacity as a basin to mitigate some or even all of the volatility we have seen at Waha the last couple of years. For Permian Resources Corporation, we are pretty well insulated from Waha volatility this year and going forward. We have made a tremendous effort to get better in gas marketing and feel like we have gotten there. As you can see on slide six, 90% of our gas this year will price either hedged at attractive Waha prices or at non-Waha destinations. Same with 2027. So for us, this year may be challenged more broadly, next year should get better, and we are in a fortunate position after a lot of hard work. On the FCF/share framework, when we say we are focused on free cash flow per share, that is over the very long term—not single years and certainly not quarters. Our goal is to do what we have done on slide 12 for the next five, ten, twenty years. You cannot underinvest and generate that kind of growth over the long term. There are different ways to focus on FCF/share. Where our business is today, it is more numerator-focused than denominator-focused given our opportunities to reinvest organically and grow, and inorganically through acquisitions. The right way for us—and for you to evaluate us—is to look over longer-term periods and not focus overly on this year or next, or this quarter or that quarter. Look at the arc of FCF/share growth over the long term.
OP
Operator
Operator
You now have a question from John Abbott with Wolfe Research. Go ahead, John.
JA
John Holliday Abbott
Analyst · Wolfe Research. Go ahead, John
Hey. Good morning, and thank you for taking our questions. The question is on growth. You are sort of in this yellow light scenario, to use one of the phrases from a peer. We could see a more constructive environment in the second half of the year or into 2027. As you look at your crystal ball, what is the likelihood that you could start to grow in 2027, and when would you make that decision? And given inventory in hand and ground game, can you remind us on the extent you are willing to grow over a multiyear basis?
JW
James H. Walter
Management
Yes. Kind of as you said, we are flat over the course of the year from Q1 to Q4 in this environment. But it is worth pointing out our production is 5% higher in 2026 than 2025. For us, that probably is a yellow light. As we look into the future, it does not take much for a business of our size with our nimble operating team and lean culture to return to a more growthy scenario. We want to be confident in the macro and not get out ahead of it. We will be looking for real confidence that there is better supply-demand balance that needs our barrels over the coming years. Growth depends on macro, oil price, and service cost environment. Historically, when we have grown closer to 10% per year—that starts to feel higher—but something in the mid- to high-single digits in an attractive reinvestment and capital deployment environment is certainly something we can get excited about and something we have the inventory base to prosecute.
JA
John Holliday Abbott
Analyst · Wolfe Research. Go ahead, John
And then a follow-up: you are about 50% hedged for oil this year. How are you thinking about hedges as you think to 2027? If you have a more positive oil environment, how are you thinking about hedges?
GO
Guy M. Oliphint
Analyst · Wolfe Research. Go ahead, John
Yeah, John, this is Guy. We are a little bit less hedged than that for 2026. Our targets, as we have talked about consistently, are 30%, 20%, 10%—year one, two, and three out. I do not know that the macro weighs in too much into how we hedge. We think those targets make sense, and hedging still makes sense despite our strong balance sheet because it is more capital that we have to deploy in the downturn. If we take hedge proceeds when there is $50 oil, there are likely buybacks to do, acquisitions to make—those sorts of things. Where we try to be flexible is leaning in during periods of volatility. In the last year those periods have been pretty short, so we hedge into those opportunistically, but we are not going to programmatically hit our targets at lower oil prices than we think are mid-cycle just to force it. We have done a good job of getting to those targets despite that. It fits how we think about capital allocation, particularly in a downturn.
OP
Operator
Operator
Thank you. The next question comes from Philip Jungwirth with BMO. Go ahead.
PJ
Phillip J. Jungwirth
Analyst · BMO. Go ahead
You mentioned earlier some of the historical consolidators in the Permian now looking to divest assets, and we saw news reports of one such deal in the last week. Given how much you have grown the company over the last couple of years, is there an upper limit on transaction size, and remind us of balance sheet parameters when you consider larger-sized deals? And as a follow-up, you guided to a $0.25 to $0.75 premium to Waha in 2026. Based on the FEP and the marketing agreements, how should we think about 2027—premium to Waha or discount to Henry Hub?
JW
James H. Walter
Management
For us, we are in the fortunate position of ample liquidity, low leverage, and hopefully on the cusp of achieving investment grade status. The limiter is not going to be access to capital; it is our comfort with leverage. We certainly have the capacity to do $1,000,000,000, $2,000,000,000, or even $3,000,000,000 of deals over the next year or two within our leverage comfort zones at $60 or $65 oil. As you spend more dollars, you do need to be more picky to ensure transactions are the right ones. We believe we have the horsepower to do whatever is coming, but we are not going to lever up or risk the business to pursue near-term free cash flow accretion. We have said that a million times.
GO
Guy M. Oliphint
Analyst · BMO. Go ahead
On pricing, if you look at that graph, the significant majority—90% plus—of our exposure in 2027 is HSC or DFW. So we will be talking about pricing relative to those benchmarks, which you can convert to relative to Hub. Next year we will not be guiding or thinking about gas on a Waha basis; we will think about it on a Gulf Coast/Texark basis.
OP
Operator
Operator
Your next question comes from Josh Silverstein with UBS Financials. Go ahead, Josh.
JS
Josh Silverstein
Analyst · UBS Financials. Go ahead, Josh
Hey. Thanks. Good morning, guys. With the additional FC capacity coming to the portfolio next year, does it change the development strategy at all? Do you drill in areas with similar oil flow rates but with greater gas mix? And on value creation, can you talk about the royalty opportunity for Permian Resources Corporation? You are now over 100,000 net acres. What is the royalty percent of your total production, and would you consider putting this into another vehicle?
WH
William M. Hickey
Management
No change. We will benefit from tailwinds of a better gas price on the roughly 700,000,000 of residue gas we sell today, but we will not allocate capital differently because of that. Oil still drives the day based on our assets.
GO
Guy M. Oliphint
Analyst · UBS Financials. Go ahead, Josh
On royalty, we have stayed away from giving explicit stats about our royalty business to date, and that still makes sense given its maturity.
JW
James H. Walter
Management
We have thought about alternatives. We have an awesome royalty business, and it fits really well within our upstream business.
WH
William M. Hickey
Management
Our royalty business is well over 90% Permian Resources Corporation operated.
JW
James H. Walter
Management
Allocating capital to higher NRI and royalty-weighted assets has been an important part of our capital efficiency story the last few years. We love having it in the business. That said, we are always looking for ways to create incremental value for shareholders. If we were convinced that business could create more value as a standalone or subsidiary-type business, that is something we have been thinking about and will continue to think about. We just have not had the right level of conviction around that value-creation story today, but we will keep evaluating in the coming months, quarters, and years.
OP
Operator
Operator
We now have a question from Marian Marney with Roth. Marian, please go ahead.
MM
Marian Marney
Analyst · Roth. Marian, please go ahead
Hey, guys. Wanted to see if you could talk a little about cadence on the year. In terms of capital or production, historically you have been a little more front-half weighted on CapEx. Is that something we are going to see again in 2026? And on production, your oil is roughly flat with 4Q. Was there any downtime in 1Q from storms and then a rebound in second quarter? Any moving parts there? And I was hoping you could also talk about the non-D&C spend—if I heard you right, you said around $400,000,000 this year. That seems like a bit higher percentage than years past. What is the focus there and what do you plan to achieve with that? Finally, on cash taxes—hardly anything this year—what is the outlook? Does that start to pick up in 2027, or more of a 2028 thing?
WH
William M. Hickey
Management
Production should be flat throughout the year. Shout-out to the team in the field and in the office—they worked their absolute tail off to keep the overwhelming majority of our production online during the storm. It is impressive what they do and how bought in they are. So production flat—you will not see a Q1 dip due to the storm. On CapEx, it is flat throughout the year. Nothing dramatic. You may see some fluctuations intra-quarter, but first half/second half is relatively equally weighted. On non-D&C spend, we have not seen the same amount of deflation as in other parts of the business. It is a lot of tanks, vessels, steel, compression—things that have been less deflationary.
JW
James H. Walter
Management
The efficiency gains on D&C have been extraordinary. Teams responsible for other CapEx components have done a really good job, but that has been more about stemming tariff-driven inflation. Over time, as the business matures, we are confident we can reduce spending on infrastructure and other CapEx, but this year it makes sense that you have not seen the same reduction for the reasons Will outlined.
GO
Guy M. Oliphint
Analyst · Roth. Marian, please go ahead
On cash taxes, our guidance is consistent with what we have discussed. We thought 2026 would be low. We thought 2027 would be low based on strip, and that has played out. Based on where we are today, we do not see ourselves being a full cash taxpayer until 2028 or beyond.
OP
Operator
Operator
Your next question comes from Noah Hungness with Bank of America. Noah, please go ahead.
NH
Noah B. Hungness
Analyst · Bank of America. Noah, please go ahead
I wanted to start on the balance sheet. You increased accounts receivable by $20,000,000 quarter-over-quarter. What drove that, and would you expect that to unwind through 2026? And on average lateral length—you have continued to increase it. This year you are going to be at 11,000 feet on average. Do you think there is further upside to get to two and a half miles, and if so, what would that do for D&C per foot costs?
GO
Guy M. Oliphint
Analyst · Bank of America. Noah, please go ahead
We have seen AR and AP grow—so working capital pretty constant even though those gross balances are up. As our business scales, those balances correlate with that. There was not a change in total working capital or a draw—just balances increasing as the size of the business grows.
WH
William M. Hickey
Management
On lateral length, maybe on the margin there are a few places in the existing position that, now that we are comfortable going longer, we can. But for the most part, we have done the work and set it up for how we are going to drill it. Most units are set up pretty well for two miles, two and a half, or in some cases three. Where you could see change over time is as we buy and core up new assets. The land team has been told the ideal lateral length is probably closer to two and a half than two, and they will do the work accordingly to extend laterals further. If you added an extra ~2,500 feet, the D&C per foot reduction only helps—likely low double-digit dollars-per-foot reduction, say $20–$25 per foot, as a rough guess.
NH
Noah B. Hungness
Analyst · Bank of America. Noah, please go ahead
Okay. Yeah. No. That is really helpful. Thanks, guys.
OP
Operator
Operator
As a reminder, if you wish to ask a question, please press star followed by the one. Your next question comes from Paul Diamond with Citi. Paul, please go ahead.
PD
Paul Michael Diamond
Analyst · Citi. Paul, please go ahead
Good morning. Quick one on reserve replacement. You have done well replacing drilling locations over the last few years. Given the geographic focus up in the Northern Delaware, should we expect the same? Is the intent to replace more up there, or is that just where recent deals have been? And as you approach investment grade across all three agencies, how do you think about any potential shift in your financial strategy on the other side—is it moving you at all, or business as usual?
JW
James H. Walter
Management
2025 was certainly more New Mexico heavy in terms of inventory acquisitions. That is largely opportunity-set driven. We love our Texas assets. We did a pretty inventory-heavy acquisition in Texas in 2024 with the Beryl Draw transaction, and that was a heck of a deal. We were really excited at the time and probably even more excited today. Generally, there is likely more inventory available and likely to come for sale in New Mexico than in Texas over the next five years. So more likely to do deals up there than in Texas, but we are agnostic—we would love to do more in Texas if the right deal came along. It depends on what is for sale and what we can get at a price that creates value for shareholders.
GO
Guy M. Oliphint
Analyst · Citi. Paul, please go ahead
On investment grade, why we are focused on it fits with our strategy. We want to reduce our cost of capital and have long-term capital availability. From a timing perspective, we have been at investment grade credit metrics for a long time. Our financial policies have conformed to investment grade policies, and we have built the business quickly but always consistent with those policies. It has clear benefits going forward, and we think we meet the criteria today.
PD
Paul Michael Diamond
Analyst · Citi. Paul, please go ahead
Understood. Appreciate the time. I will leave it there. Thank you.
OP
Operator
Operator
There are no further questions, so I will turn the call over to James Walter for closing remarks. Please continue.
JW
James H. Walter
Management
Thank you. Having gotten off to a great start for 2026, our primary goal remains the same: to maximize shareholder value over the long term by growing free cash flow per share. We expect 2026 and the years to come to look a lot like the past few years. And to do that, we plan to continue to build on our track record of delivering consistent results with the lowest cost structure in the Delaware Basin. Thank you to everyone for joining the call today and following the Permian Resources Corporation story.
OP
Operator
Operator
Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes today's conference call. Thank you for your participation. You may now disconnect.