I’ve been working on my presentation for Investing Daily’s Investing Summit at the end of the month in Denver, and am already excited about sharing it here soon after.

The mile-high view is that the resilience of the U.S. midstream sector remains underestimated, as is the world’s need for additional energy supply from North America over the next few years.

What’s striking, though, is that despite the big oil rally over March and April, the implied bullishness really hasn’t trickled down into the prices of many of the largest master limited partnerships. The Alerian MLP Index is down 3% year-to-date, with a flat total return factoring in the yield.

It’s even down 1.3% since Jan. 21, when crude fetched $48 a barrel. The trouble is, that best-known Alerian index has recently become less reflective of the midstream sector after losing Kinder Morgan Partners (and soon Williams Partners) to the new fashion for MLP buyouts by corporate sponsors.

All I know is that the MLP Profits Best Buys are seriously outperforming the Alerian, thanks in part to a couple of corporate giants not in the Alerian because they pay income or happen to operate as an MLP general partner, even though both remain huge midstream players. We are also outperforming thanks to some names off the beaten path picked up while they were discounted heavily in January by indiscriminate sellers.

The 10 investments on the Best Buys list published Jan. 21 have appreciated 13.1% since (not counting distributions), vs. the Alerian’s -1.3% depreciation.

CVR Refining (NYSE: CVRR) has rallied 43% over that span, while DKL Logistics (NYSE: DKL) is up 28% in four months, and has lined up enough attractive growth opportunities to justify an increased buy limit. We’ve championed the downstream theme for months and plan to keep riding this powerful current.

We’re also increasing out buy limit on Energy Transfer Equity (NYSE: ETE), which has also risen 28%, but not on Williams (NYSE: WMB), another Best Buy that’s up 26%.

Despite the Alerian’s drift over the last four months, only two of our top 10 picks are down.

The rationale for the Williams merger and the financial engineering dilemmas confronting Energy Transfer are laid out in the first of this week’s two In Focus features. The second deals with the proposed new Internal Revenue Service rules on what constitutes MLP qualifying income. It’s possible to spin such issues as problems, but fortunately they’re ones investment bankers and tax lawyers are used to solving.

The Portfolio Update this month attempts to put many of the quarterly results and conference calls from the past month in context. That doesn’t use any more space than a copy-and-paste job from a press release, but does take a lot more time, but I hope you will find that context highly useful.

Most of the portfolio is covered in some detail, and the remaining entries showing only the past month’s performance and our target will get more space and time in June.

The portfolio on the whole seems to be performing reasonably well, if not quite as well as the Best Buys. (I haven’t compiled the overall numbers and won’t do so until the end of June.) It’s gratifying to see recent recommendations like Cedar Fair (NYSE: FUN), NuStar Holdings (NYSE: NSH) and Blackstone (NYSE: BX) get off to hot starts, and we’re not going to apologize for following MLP profits beyond the energy industry to private equity and amusement parks.

Portfolio Action Summary

• EQT GP Holdings (NYSE: EQGP) recently added to Aggressive Portfolio; buy below $33
• Hi-Crush Partners (NYSE: HCLP) downgraded to a Hold in Aggressive Portfolio
• EQT Midstream (NYSE: EQM) recently upgraded to a Buy below $100 in Growth Portfolio
• Cedar Fair (NYSE: FUN) buy limit increased from $58 to $60 in Aggressive Portfolio
• Delek Logistics Partners (NYSE: DKL) buy limit increased from $45 to $52 in Growth Portfolio
• Energy Transfer Equity (NYSE: ETE) buy limit increased to $75 from $65 in Aggressive Portfolio
• EnLink Midstream (NYSE: ENLC) buy limit lowered to $35 from $44 in Aggressive Portfolio
• Navios Maritime Partners (NYSE: NMM) buy limit recently lowered to $12 from $17.70 in Aggressive Portfolio
• Targa Resources (NYSE: TRGP) buy limit lowered to $110 from $135 in Growth Portfolio.