Howard Midstream Energy Partners LLC (HEP) successfully completed a number of strategic transactions over the past year, which marginally improved our view of the company?s credit quality. As a result, we affirmed our 'BB-' issuer credit rating on HEP. At the same time, we affirmed our issue-level rating on HEP's senior unsecured notes at 'B+.' The '5' (25%) recovery rating is unchanged. The stable outlook reflects our expectation that HEP will maintain ample liquidity and adjusted EBITDA will be approximately $330 million-$350 million 2025 and 2026 following the integration of newly acquired assets and the completion of growth projects. In April 2024, HEP acquired an additional 43% in their Catalyst Midstream joint venture with Devon. These gathering and processing assets
