Admittedly, this parameter is insufficient. It measures the performance of a company against the expectations of brokerage firms. In other words ,it is the target price used by brokers and analysts in reports to show how they expect a share in a particular company to perform. Therefore, it gives a picture of the performance of any given company in the current moment only. The target price is included at the end of reports by analysts and brokers and reflects where they think the share price will be if their predictions are correct. It should be said up front that this parameter does not reflect our own evaluation of shares or companies and that it is not at all comprehensive in defining the position of any given company.

Why this should be considered, then? Because it is a simple way to know the trends in the existing market. By detecting the line of activities of the top companies, one can sense the general directions of the market and see a real analysis of its conditions as they stand. Therefore, it actually surpasses any judgement on a specific company to a wider perspective of where the whole sector is going and what kinds of problems it faces.

The first company to spotlight is Blueknight Energy Partner, which is a midstream company that offers terminal facilities, storage, processing, gathering, and transportation services. It works mainly in liquid asphalt and crude oil. Its assets are a capacity of storage up to 17.3 million barrels of crude, 1000 kilometers of pipelines, a fleet of oil transportation trucks, about 50 acres of land in Cushing Interchange in Oklahoma, and 50 liquid asphalt terminals and storage facilities.

The second company is the recovering Sanchez Midstream Holdings, which engages in the acquisition, development, ownership, and operation of midstream and other energy-related assets in the United States. It operates in two segments, midstream and production. The midstream segment engages in gathering, processing, and transporting natural gas, natural gas liquids (NGLs), and oil. This segment owns an oil and natural gas gathering system with approximately 150 miles of gathering pipelines, as well as four gathering and processing facilities, including stabilizers, storage tanks, compressors and dehydration units, and other related assets in Western Catarina, which is located in Dimmit and Webb Counties, Texas. It also provides upstream production services from the Eagle Ford Shale.

The [production segment is involved in the production of crude oil and natural gas. As of December 31, 2017, this segment had total estimated proved reserves of approximately 5.3 million barrels of oil equivalent. The company also owns production assets in Texas, Louisiana, and Oklahoma. Sanchez Midstream Partners GP LLC serves as the general partner of the company. The company was formerly known as Sanchez Production Partners LP and changed its name to Sanchez Midstream Partners LP in June 2017. Sanchez Midstream Partners LP was founded in 2005 and is headquartered in Houston, Texas.

The third company is NGL Energy Partner, which is a diversified midstream company that provides multiple services to producers and end-users. It works in the fields of transportation, storage, blending, and marketing of crude oil, NGLs and refined products/renewables. One of its main domains is also water solutions and retail propane trade. It is active in the shale sector, rail transportation, terminal services, crude storage, and pipelines.

The fourth company is Energy Transfer Partners, which is now a merger of Energy Transfer Partners (ETP) and Sunoco Logistics Partners (SXL). Energy Transfer is a Texas-based company that began in 1995 as a small intrastate natural gas pipeline operator and is now one of the largest and most diversified investment grade master limited partnerships in the United States. Energy Transfer Partners has grown from roughly 300 kilometers of natural gas pipelines in 2002 to more than 115,000 kilometers of natural gas, natural gas liquids (NGLs), refined products, and crude oil pipelines today.

The fifth company is Green Plains Partners, which provides ethanol and fuel storage, terminal, and transportation services by owning, operating, developing, and acquiring ethanol and fuel storage tanks, terminals, transportation assets, and other related assets and businesses. Its main fields of operations are ethanol storage facilities, fuel terminal facilities, and transportation.

The final company is Cross America Partners, which is a distributor of gasoline and other branded products for motor vehicles in the United States. The company distributes fuel to approximately 1,200 locations and owns or leases approximately 900 sites in 29 states.

We chose these six companies because they are sufficient to establish the foundation of our argument, which is simple: Midstream companies tend to perform very well in transitional circumstances when the market moves in an upward trend. The reason is that the basic infrastructure that is able to service expansion is not readily available to cover this occurring expansion.

Furthermore, midstream companies collectively are always a parameter that provides a detailed analysis of the actual conditions of the market. This helps explain why the U.S. energy sector is heading for a considerable boom. Midstream companies will not perform as well if investors’ expectations are bearish.