Shares for Dakota Access Pipeline Company up 15 Percent After Donald Trump Win
President Barack Obama smiles with David Archambault II, Standing Rock Sioux Tribe Leader, after entering the Cannonball pow wow grounds at the start of the Cannonball Flag Dag Celebration on Friday, June 13, 2014. (Kevin Cederstrom/Forum News Service)
Say what you want about Donald Trump, but he is definitely not going to be as hostile to the development of fossil fuel resources as Barack Obama has been, or Hillary Clinton would have been.
As evidence in support of that point, the shares for the company trying to complete the Dakota Access Pipeline here in North Dakota jumped on news of Trump winning last night.
The assumption that President-elect Donald Trump will be light on regulation and pro fossil fuels has lifted shares of pipeline company Energy Transfer Equity (ETE) and its crop of related master limited partnerships.
Energy Transfer Partners (ETP) is embroiled in controversy over the Dakota Access Pipeline. Protesters, including the local tribe, the Standing Rock Sioux, are fighting completion of the the $3.7 billion pipeline.
On Wednesday, Energy Transfer Equity shares were up 15% in early trading because investors now expect the pipeline to proceed, says Jay Hatfield, portfolio manager of InfraCap MLP ETF(AMZA). ETP was 10% higher.
Meanwhile, the environmental activists doing public relations work for the Standing Rock Sioux tribe put out this statement (full release below) from tribal Chairman David Archambault in reaction to Trump’s victory. Archambault pleads with Obama to block the pipeline in his remaining weeks in office:
“The results of last night’s election indicate that we as a country have so much work to do. We must strengthen our resolve to protect the water, pray together for understanding, and pour our hearts and minds into the future of our children. This is what our ancestors did for us under extraordinarily difficult circumstances. And we stand strong today as Lakota and Dakota people with our allies, advocating for those not yet born, and all our relatives who have no voice.
In this time of uncertainty, President Obama still has the power to give our children hope. We believe halting the Dakota Access pipeline presents a unique opportunity for President Obama to set a lasting and true legacy and respect the sovereignty and treaty rights of Standing Rock and tribal nations across America.”
At this point I think the most the anti-oil, anti-pipeline activists can hope for from President Obama is a delay in the pipeline’s construction. Whatever orders Obama gives on the easement in the coming weeks can be undone by the Trump administration in January.
Trump winning last night was probably the last nail in the coffin of the #NoDAPL movement.
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