Out Fox The $treet

After a great 2012 in the pipeline business, Plains All American Pipeline, L.P. (PAA) completed a transaction to increase the focus on rail transportation growth. The company finalized a $500M deal to acquire several loading facilities for railroads though the existing enterprise value of nearly $22B limits the impact of this rail move. Plains All American engages in the transportation, storage, terminalling, and marketing of crude oil, refined products, and liquid petroleum gas (LPG) products in the United States and Canada. The move highlights the transformational currents under cutting the pipeline business. As crude oil has been unable to transverse the current pipeline system to reach the refineries on the coasts, the railroads have stepped up with more direct routes that bypass the congested Cushing, OK oil hub. Not only is it a boon to railroads struggling with weak coal shipments, but exploration and refinery companies are access to better pricing than currently available. R...

MLPs or Master Limited Partnerships make for interesting investing dilemmas right now. On one hand, the dividend yields on popular MLPs such as Magellan Midstream Partners, L.P. (MMP) at 4.5% are a lot more lucrative than Treasury yields. The rate on the 10 year at 1.44% is paltry in comparison to this MLP. On the other hand, the yields for most MLPs are at multi year lows from surging stock prices. Magellan Midstream Partners is a publicly traded partnership that primarily transports, stores and distributes petroleum products. The partnership owns the longest petroleum products pipeline system in the country, with access to more than 40% of the nation's refining capacity, and can store 80 million barrels of petroleum products such as gasoline, diesel fuel and crude oil. Read the full article at Seeking Alpha. Disclosure: No positions mentioned. Please review the disclaimer page for more details.