Only time will tell whether last week’s bounce was a dead cat, but after months of negative performance the MLP sector finally turned in a strong week. The Alerian MLP Index saw a total return of 5.1% for the week, while the UBS ETRACS 2x Monthly Leveraged Long Alerian MLP Infrastructure Index ETN (NYSE: MLPL) gained 11.3%.  

There were quite a few double-digit gainers last week, with two turning in performances of over 40% in a single week.


Source: MLPData.

The fertilizer MLPs have done very well this year thanks to low natural gas prices and strong fertilizer demand, but Rentech Nitrogen Partners’ (NYSE: RNF) huge weekly gain was a result of a merger agreement with CVR Partners (NYSE: UAN) to create North America’s fifth-largest nitrogen fertilizer producer. The offer for RNF was at a 33% premium to the previous week’s closing price for RNF, and RNF units surged nearly 50% for the week on the news.

American Midstream Partners (NYSE: AMID) was 2013’s best performing midstream MLP with a gain of 98.5% for the year. Last week investors bid shares up by 46.7% after AMID announced an attractively priced dropdown acquisition and projected 5% annual distribution growth following the dropdown. Still, that surge wasn’t enough to pull AMID out of negative territory for the year.

The same can be said of the other double-digit gainers for the week; it wasn’t enough to put them in positive territory for 2015. The one exception was Navios Maritime Midstream Partners (NYSE: NAP), a partnership that owns, operates and acquires crude oil tankers. Units of NAP are up 30% on the year.

The bottom 10 performers for the week were the usual suspects — the partnerships producing oil and coal. Units for these partnerships was down across the board by 8-10% for the week, and they comprise the vast majority of the 15 MLPs that are down at least 50% year-to-date.  

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