David Schulte, chairman, president, and CEO of CorEnergy Infrastructure Trust, Inc. (NYSE: CORR), participated in a video interview during Nareit’s CEO Forum & Advocacy Day at The Hay-Adams hotel in Washington, D.C.
Schulte discussed the importance of diversification to CorEnergy’s business strategy. “We want to be diversified across energy commodities, oil, gas, and other products, as well as across the energy value chain,” including upstream, midstream, and downstream operators, he said.
Schulte also commented on the “growing global investment appetite for the investment characteristics of the infrastructure asset class.” He noted that by owning infrastructure assets in a REIT, “we have a very efficient tax structure that can be owned by virtually any investor.”
Meanwhile, Schulte noted that lower oil prices and volatility have resulted in increased discipline among upstream energy companies since 2014. He pointed out that companies are willing to sell infrastructure assets that they don’t need to own, which benefits CorEnergy. “We think it’s opened the playing field for us to be a more attractive source of long-term equity-oriented capital for upstream companies to do business with.”