This week I’m seeking a prestigious and long-term dividend-paying stock from the energy sector. 

That sector includes six industries all related to bringing oil and gas to market. They are: drilling, exploration and production (E&P), equipment and services, integrated, midstream, refining & marketing.(Those oily and gassy enterprises.)

Today I’m reviewing a large-cap oil and gas midstream firm named Spectra Energy Partners LP. Its trading ticker symbol is SEP. 

Spectra Energy Partners LP is a Houston-based master limited partnership. The company owns and operates natural gas transmission, gathering and storage assets, and transportation and storage assets.

As of December 31, 2007, it owned and operated 100% of the approximately 1,400-mile East Tennessee interstate natural gas transportation system that extends from central Tennessee eastward into southwest Virginia and northern North Carolina, and southward into northern Georgia; and a liquefied natural gas storage facility in Kingsport, Tennessee.

The company also owned a 24.5% interest in the approximate 700-mile Gulfstream interstate natural gas transportation system, which extends from Pascagoula, Mississippi, and Mobile, Alabama across the Gulf of Mexico and into Florida; a 50% interest in Market Hub, which owns and operates 2 salt cavern natural gas storage facilities,

The company transports and stores natural gas for local gas distribution companies, municipal utilities, interstate and intrastate pipelines, direct industrial users, electric power generators, marketers, and producers.

Spectra Energy Partners (DE) GP, LP, operates as the general partner to Spectra Energy Partners, LP. The company is based in Houston, Texas.

I use three key data points to gauge the value of any dividend equity or fund like Spectra Energy Partners LP (SEP): 

(1) Price

(2) Dividends

(3) Returns

Besides those three, four more keys will finally unlock an equity or fund in which to invest.