Enbridge

IThe business

Enbridge moves energy for the people who need it delivered. It is a Calgary company with four businesses: oil pipelines, gas pipelines, gas utilities and a small renewable power arm. Most of the cash comes from charging fees to move or store energy it does not own, under a regulator’s tariff or a long contract. That is the whole idea, and it is why people own it for the dividend.

All company figures are in Canadian dollars, marked C$, because that is how Enbridge reports, under US accounting rules. It files 10-Ks and 10-Qs with the SEC and lists in both Toronto and New York. Per-share values on this page are in Canadian dollars against the Toronto close, with US dollar equivalents at the Bank of Canada’s 1.3960 on the price date. The New York close of US$49.46 equals C$69.05 at that rate, within 0.1% of the Toronto C$69.11.¹²¹⁰ TTM means the twelve months to 30 June 2026. Enbridge reports the third quarter on 6 November, after this page’s date limit.¹¹

Over those twelve months revenue was C$83.5B, adjusted EBITDA C$20.07B, distributable cash flow (DCF) C$12.57B and earnings to common holders C$5.70B C (calculated).³⁴⁶ Revenue is a poor guide here. Commodity sales, the buying and selling of crude, gas and power at a thin margin, were C$35.8B in the first six months of 2026 alone, so most of the revenue line is pass-through.⁵ Adjusted EBITDA and DCF are the company’s own measures, and I use them with care, as the Financials section shows.

Liquids pipelines

This is the biggest part, C$9.7B or 49% of 2025 adjusted EBITDA C (calculated).³ The system delivers about six million barrels a day, which the company calls the largest crude and liquids network in the world; its 2026 circular puts that at about 30% of the crude oil produced in North America, about 70% of Canadian exports to the US and about 40% of US crude imports.⁷⁹ The centre of it is the Mainline: the Canadian Mainline has six adjacent pipelines with an operating capacity of about 3.2 million barrels a day, and it joins the Lakehead System, which runs from the border across the US Midwest.⁷ In 2025 it was effectively full, delivering 3.1 million barrels a day.⁷ The company also owns export docks on the Gulf (the Ingleside terminal near Corpus Christi, the largest crude export terminal in North America by volume, with 1.6 million barrels a day of export capability), the Flanagan South line to Cushing and, with a 50% interest, the Seaway line on to the Gulf Coast, the Express-Platte line from Alberta to Illinois, and 27.6% of the Bakken pipeline system, which includes the Dakota Access pipeline.⁷

The Mainline is tolled under a settlement that runs to the end of 2028. About 70% of Mainline deliveries are tolled under it, and the other 30% on a full-path basis. A performance band is meant to keep the Mainline’s return between 11% and 14.5% on a deemed 50% equity capitalization.⁷ What that means in plain words: Enbridge can’t earn much more than 14.5% on that equity, and the band is meant to stop it earning less than 11%.

Gas transmission

Gas Transmission earned C$5.4B in 2025, 27% of the total C (calculated).³ The assets are mostly in the US: Texas Eastern, which moves up to 12.1 billion cubic feet a day from the Gulf Coast to Ohio, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and New York; Algonquin, 3.1 billion cubic feet a day into New England; East Tennessee, Vector, and half of Gulfstream and Sabal Trail.⁷ In Canada it owns the BC Pipeline, which carries gas from northeast British Columbia to the coast and the US Pacific Northwest. A First Nations partnership representing 38 groups bought 12.47% of it in July 2025 for about C$736M, and in September 2026 two funds led by KKR agreed to put in about C$2.7B for up to 29% of the whole Westcoast system as expansions are built.⁷²¹

These pipelines make money from capacity that customers have reserved, not from how much gas flows. The 2025 gain came from rate cases at Algonquin and Texas Eastern, more favourable contracting, and the Venice Extension on Texas Eastern entering service.⁷ The growth story is demand: gas-fired power for data centres, liquefied natural gas exports on the Gulf and in British Columbia, and a Permian build-out where Enbridge holds a 10% stake in the 2.5 billion cubic feet a day Matterhorn Express line.⁷ In July 2026 it took a decision to build the 2.6 billion cubic feet a day Bay Runner Twin pipeline with partners, to feed the Rio Grande LNG plant under take-or-pay contracts.⁴

Gas utilities

Gas Distribution and Storage earned C$4.1B, 21% of the total, and it more than doubled in two years because Enbridge bought three utilities from Dominion Energy in 2024: The East Ohio Gas Company, Questar Gas (Utah, Wyoming and Idaho) and Public Service Company of North Carolina. The price was C$19.1B (US$14.0B), including assumed debt.²⁰³ With Enbridge Gas in Ontario and Quebec, the utilities serve over seven million customers.⁴ The 2025 rate cases matter because they set the return: Ontario earns an allowed 9.21% return on equity on a 38% equity layer, and the 2025 Ohio order came in at 9.79% on 51.9% equity, with C$330M of disallowed pension and other assets that Enbridge wrote off.⁷

Renewable power

The smallest segment, C$672M or 3% of 2025 adjusted EBITDA C (calculated), is about 4,100 megawatts of net generating capacity: wind and solar in Texas and Wyoming, offshore wind off France, and a growing pipeline of projects with power purchase agreements to Meta.⁷³⁴ I treat it as a small utility-like business and don’t value it separately.

Where the cash goes

The company’s secured backlog of growth projects is C$41B through about 2033, and management says its debt capacity can fund C$10B to C$11B of growth capital a year.⁴ It expects to place C$8B in service in 2026.³ Those projects are the whole growth case. They are also why the owner cash falls so far short of DCF, as the Financials section shows.

IIThe moat

A durable business keeps others from taking its profit. For a pipeline, the protection is physical and legal: nobody lays a competing pipe next to a full one without years of permits, and the toll is set by a regulator or a contract. The record over the last decade shows what that did for owners, and it is mixed.

DCF per share was C$4.08 in 2016 and C$5.71 in 2025, which is 3.8% a year C (calculated).¹²³ Dividends per share went from C$2.12 to C$3.77, or 6.6% a year over nine years and 4.2% a year since 2019 C (calculated).⁶ The share count went from 911M to 2.18B, because Enbridge merged with Spectra Energy in 2017, which took the share count from 943M to 1.70B at year-end, and sold stock to pay for the Dominion utilities in 2023 and 2024.¹²²⁰⁶ Total DCF grew 3.4 times; DCF per share grew 1.4 times C (calculated). A pipeline is a durable asset, but the money has to be paid for with shares and debt. Anyone who bought at the end of 2016 at C$56.50 had a price of C$69.11 ten years later, plus C$31.16 of dividends over 2016 to 2025 C (calculated).¹⁶ That is a fair record. It is not a record of a business with pricing power.

What does protect it

• The Mainline. It is full, and the next barrel of Canadian heavy crude to the US Gulf Coast has few other ways to travel. Management said Mainline Optimization Phase 1 adds 150,000 barrels a day to the Mainline and 100,000 to Flanagan South by 2027, and Phase 2 (250,000 barrels a day) is under development for 2028.⁷ The tolling settlement already covers the capital: up to US$1.3B of Mainline investment through 2028 earns a return under it.⁷
• Regulated returns. About a fifth of EBITDA comes from gas utilities whose returns are set by regulators, and a good part of gas transmission earns cost-of-service rates. Ontario’s 9.21% allowed return holds until the next rebasing, expected in 2029.⁷
• Contracts with good counterparties. The Southern Illinois Connector, Pelican CO2 Hub and Canyon System pipelines are backed by long-term take-or-pay agreements, many with investment-grade customers.⁷
• A rate base that grows. Utility and cost-of-service assets earn on what is invested in them, so spending grows earnings. This is the engine, and the cost is in the next section.
• Tolls that adjust. The Mainline settlement escalates operating, administration and power costs with US consumer prices and power indices, and Lakehead index rates adjust each year within a ceiling.⁷

Where it is thin

Four things. First, the Mainline settlement ends on 31 December 2028, and the next one has to be negotiated with shippers who know the line is full and know producers have rail as an alternative.⁷ The company says rail becomes competitive when pipeline capacity is short or price differentials are volatile.⁷ Second, the regulators say yes and no: the Ohio order in 2025 cut revenue and wrote off C$330M, and the appeal is at the Ohio Supreme Court.⁷ Third, the permits can be revoked at the edge, as Line 5 shows. Fourth, there is nothing here that earns more when volumes rise past a point, since capacity is the product. I would call it protection with a ceiling.

Capital intensity is the quiet part. Maintenance capital was only C$1.08B over the twelve months, 5% of EBITDA, against C$5.7B of depreciation in 2025.⁴³⁷ Pipelines last a long time, and a lot of what a utility spends to renew pipe is booked as growth because it earns a return; but I can’t tell from the filings how much of the C$9.7B of growth spending is really keeping the base where it is. I deal with that in Valuation by testing how little the answer changes when I vary it.

IIIThe competitive advantage

The question is what Enbridge can do that others can’t. On the evidence the answer is scale, connection and the habit of doing what it says.

It has met its financial guidance 20 years in a row, the company says, and in 2025 it delivered DCF per share of C$5.71 against a guided range of C$5.50 to C$5.90 C (calculated).³⁹ I have no way to test the full run from filings I could open, so I take the 20 years as the company’s claim; what I can check is the last decade of results above, which show DCF per share rising every year but one, 2017.¹² That is unusual for a company this large.

The connection is the second part. The same firm that carries oil from Alberta to the Midwest can take it on to the Gulf Coast docks, can offer gas capacity to a new power plant in North Carolina, and can supply electricity to Meta from a solar farm it builds. The 10-K calls this cross-selling and says the four businesses share customers and regulators.⁷ It matters most at the points where Enbridge has a long head start: one connected network to the Gulf export terminals, and Texas Eastern running through the biggest gas demand centre in the US.

The third part is funding. A company that can borrow at investment-grade rates and has people willing to put in equity at a 5.6% yield can build things others can’t. The Dominion deal was financed with C$4.6B of equity in September 2023 and a stack of debt, and the September 2026 stock sale of 38.9M shares at C$66.85 raised about C$2.5B after costs to help pay for two crude acquisitions.²⁰²¹ That access is a real advantage and also the reason a holder needs to read the share count.

Against its closest rivals

The filings name few direct competitors. In liquids the 10-K lists the alternatives as rail and trucking, and says pipeline competition comes down to access to supply and markets, cost and reliability.⁷ In gas the real competitors are other pipelines to the same markets, and in utilities there is none inside a franchise. I have not built a peer table from other companies’ filings, so I won’t put rival numbers here that I haven’t checked. The comparison I can do is against other pages on this site, and it is in Valuation.

New supply

The risk to the advantage isn’t a competing pipe. It’s that the thing being moved stops growing, or moves another way. Canadian production has to keep rising for the Mainline to be worth expanding, and US demand for Canadian heavy crude depends on Venezuelan and Middle Eastern supply, which the 10-K flags as a variable: lower supply of heavy crude from Latin America and the Middle East was driving demand for Canadian barrels on the Gulf Coast in 2025.⁷ If that supply came back, the effect would show up first in the price differential and then in the next expansion decision, not in the current tolls.

IVManagement

Greg Ebel, chief executive since January 2023, retires on 31 December 2026. He came to Enbridge in 2017 when it merged with Spectra Energy, where he had been chairman, president and chief executive, and he chaired the Enbridge board until he took the top job. He will stay on as an adviser to the board and his successor until May 2027.⁹⁸ Michele Harradence takes over on 1 January. She has run the gas utilities since 2022, including bringing the three Dominion utilities in, and earlier worked in the oil sands and in refining.⁸ Pat Murray, with the company 28 years, has been chief financial officer since July 2023, and Steve Williams chairs the board.⁹ The change is planned and comes from inside, which is the good version. It also means the person who sanctioned the C$41B backlog is leaving just as the first big acquisitions of the new era are closing.

How they are paid, and what that pays them to do

Ebel’s 2025 pay was C$24.4M: C$1.96M of salary, C$13.4M of stock awards, C$3.36M of options, a C$4.33M bonus, C$1.0M for pension value and C$0.28M of other items. It was C$23.8M in 2024 and C$18.7M in 2023 C (calculated).⁹ The board says 91% of the chief executive’s target pay is at risk, and that total shareholder return was 125% over the five years 2021 to 2025, a stretch that started near the low of the pandemic year (the shares closed 2020 at C$40.71 C (calculated)).⁹¹ The company also paid C$1.33M under a tax equalization program for employees on assignment away from their home country, and that sum is not in those totals.⁹

The annual bonus targets 150% of salary for the chief executive and is 85% on a company scorecard, with the rest on individual performance. In the scorecard the weights are 40% on DCF per share against the guidance range, 25% on business-unit adjusted EBITDA, 20% on safety and 15% on strategy and execution, which includes return on projects against budget, cost against budget, emissions and cyber. In 2025 the DCF per share target was C$5.70, with C$5.50 as the threshold and C$5.90 the maximum, taken from the company’s guidance range, and the result was on target at C$5.70.⁹ The units that vest after three years pay 45% on DCF per share growth, 45% on total shareholder return against a peer group of 75% midstream and 25% utility companies, and 10% on greenhouse gas intensity.⁹

The 2023 awards show what these tests mean. The DCF per share target was growth of 1.2% a year over three years, against the roughly 3% the company was guiding to for those years, and the maximum was 2.1%.³ Actual growth was 2.08%, so that part paid 1.93 times. Total return landed in the 40th percentile of the peer group and paid 0.6 times. The overall payout was 1.34 times, worth C$14.4M to Ebel.⁹ I read this two ways. The bar for per-share growth was low, so it was easy to beat. And the single biggest measure counts cash flow before growth capital, so the plan rewards getting cash flow up and doesn’t ask what the capital cost. That is how I would design it if I wanted growth and a stable payout. It is also the incentive that sits behind a borrowed dividend. I found no measure of return on invested capital or of cash after growth spending, though the strategy scorecard does measure project returns against what was approved.

How much of their own money is in

A fair amount. Ebel holds 756,510 shares, about C$52M at today’s price C (calculated), and another 698,416 he can acquire within 60 days.⁹ The board puts his holdings at 31 times salary against a requirement of 8 times. The CFO is at 6 times against 4, and every named executive meets the minimum.⁹ All directors and executives together own 1.6M shares, plus 2.6M they can acquire, about 0.2% of the company C (calculated).⁹ Some directors and executives told the underwriters they were interested in buying about C$1.82M of the September share sale, and those indications weren’t binding.²¹ That is small next to the stock they are paid each year.

What they did with capital over a full cycle

On the whole this is a disciplined, patient team that buys infrastructure at fair prices and pays a rising dividend. The record also shows what the discipline costs a holder. Since 2017 net debt has gone from about C$64B to C$110B, the share count has gone from 943M at the end of 2016 to 2.2B, and per-share DCF has risen 40% since 2016 C (calculated).⁶⁵ That is not a mistake. It is what building a bigger company looks like when the incremental returns are about the cost of the money. The year 2026 will add 38.9M more shares. I give management credit for a clear target and no surprises, and I count the stock issued as a cost.

VFinancials

Reading Enbridge’s statements takes some care, because four things in them do not mean what they seem to.

• Revenue is mostly pass-through. It was C$65.2B in 2025 and C$83.5B over the last twelve months, because Enbridge buys and resells crude, gas and power. The margin on those trades is small, so the line has little to do with earnings.⁵⁶
• Reported earnings swing on hedges. Enbridge hedges currency, interest and commodity exposure and books the unrealized change in value as it happens. That gave 2025 earnings to common holders of C$7.07B against adjusted earnings of C$6.58B, and 2024 earnings of C$5.05B against C$6.04B adjusted.³ The adjusted figure is closer to the business.
• DCF is before growth capital. It starts from operating cash flow, takes off maintenance capital, interest paid, current tax, preferred dividends and minority distributions, and stops. It does not take off the C$9.7B a year spent on growth.³⁴
• Debt measures differ. The company’s Debt-to-EBITDA was 4.8 at the end of 2025 and 5.1 at 30 June 2026; mine, which counts all debt and subtracts cash, is 5.2 and 5.5.³⁴⁵

The latest quarter

The second-quarter report on 31 July was steady, and the shares fell after it, from C$78.0 on 28 July to C$69.4 by 24 August C (calculated).⁴¹ Adjusted EBITDA was C$4.78B against C$4.64B a year before, helped by US rate cases at East Tennessee, Texas Eastern and Enbridge Gas Utah. Adjusted earnings per share were C$0.63 against C$0.65, as depreciation and interest rose. DCF was C$2.95B, up 1.6%.⁴ Earnings under US accounting were C$1.40B against C$2.18B because of unrealized derivative losses.⁴ The company reaffirmed its 2026 guidance of C$20.2B to C$20.8B of adjusted EBITDA and C$5.70 to C$6.10 of DCF per share, and about 5% a year of growth in EBITDA, DCF per share and earnings per share afterwards.⁴ I can’t say why the shares fell. The quarter itself was in line with the plan, and the company sanctioned the US$1.0B Line 5 relocation and the Bay Runner Twin in the same quarter.⁴

The events after the quarter matter more for the numbers. On 26 August Enbridge agreed to buy the Salt Creek crude gathering business for US$600M. On 27 August it agreed with KKR to fund the Westcoast expansions, bringing in C$0.7B at closing on 3 September. On 8 September it announced that Ebel would retire. On 9 September it agreed to buy Tallgrass’s crude business for US$2.55B, and it sold 38.9M shares at C$66.85.²¹²³⁸ After that sale there are 2,223M shares outstanding, before any over-allotment.²¹ All of my per-share figures use that count, plus 6M units that can become shares.

What an owner can really take out

Here is the sequence that matters. Over the twelve months to June, DCF was C$12.57B. Growth capital took about C$9.68B of that, since total capital spending was C$10.76B and maintenance C$1.08B C (calculated).⁴⁵³ That leaves about C$2.89B of DCF after growth. Using operating cash flow instead, the figure after every dollar of capital is C$0.85B C (calculated). Common dividends paid were C$8.35B. So the dividend was covered 10% by cash after all capital in the last twelve months and 31% in 2025 C (calculated). The rest comes from new borrowing, and in some years from new stock.

That is not a flaw. Every pipeline company that grows runs this way: it borrows against the cash flows it is building. What it means for a holder is that the dividend isn’t a measure of what the business can pay out today. It is a measure of what the business can pay out if it keeps growing. If the growth stops, the company has the choice of cutting spending, and the dividend becomes well covered, or keeping the spending and cutting the payout. The first is easy, since most of the C$9.7B a year is discretionary until it is built, and that is the reason I believe the dividend is safe. What the numbers do say is that a holder gets back cash from a stable asset base only if the C$110B of debt on it is held steady, so debt is the next section.

Stock pay is a small matter. Total stock-based compensation was C$285M in 2025, almost all of it cash-settled units already in operating cash flow, and C$21M was options that dilute.⁷ I take nothing more off for it. Cash taxes are an open question: current tax was C$978M over the twelve months, 4.9% of EBITDA, while the income-tax expense on adjusted earnings was C$1.85B in 2025, 9.3% of EBITDA C (calculated).³⁴ The gap is deferred tax of C$21.7B on the balance sheet that will turn into cash over time.⁵ I move my model’s cash taxes from 5% of EBITDA toward 9% over ten years.

Balance sheet

At 30 June 2026 Enbridge had C$1.57B of short-term borrowings, C$6.71B of long-term debt due within a year and C$103.85B of longer debt, C$112.1B in all, against C$2.0B of cash.⁵ Net debt was C$110.1B C (calculated). On top of that it has C$6.8B of preferred shares, whose C$425M of annual dividends I deduct in DCF, about C$3.5B of minority interests, and C$36.2B of goodwill that comes from past purchases.⁵ Interest expense was C$5.1B over the twelve months, a quarter of EBITDA C (calculated). At the end of 2025 about 9% of debt had floating rates after swaps, and C$22.8B of committed credit lines were in place with C$9.7B undrawn.⁷ The company says it can fund its current projects without going to the market for twelve months.⁷ Ratings are investment grade; I did not open the agencies’ own reports, so I cannot say more.

The September stock sale and the Westcoast partners are the answer to the 5.5 figure: they bring in C$3.2B against about C$4.4B for the two crude purchases, once these close.²¹²³ The company’s stated range is 4.5 to 5.0 on its own definition.³ It was 5.1 at June, and says part of that is the exchange rate, since debt in US dollars was translated at 1.42 while EBITDA came in at 1.38.⁴ That is plausible, and I can’t size it from the filings, though translating at today’s 1.396 and not 1.42 lowers reported US dollar debt by about 1.6% C (calculated).¹⁰²¹

VIValuation

First, how this goes badly wrong

Before the numbers, I asked what would most likely hurt an owner here, and worked back. Three things stand out.

• The growth stops paying and the balance sheet has to give. The dividend is covered only if growth capital is funded with debt. With C$110B of net debt and a quarter of EBITDA going to interest, a stretch of project overruns, or of rates 100 basis points higher on the whole stock of debt, takes C$17 off my base after I also raise my required return by a point E (estimate). Enbridge has sold stock in five of the last eleven years, most recently in September.⁶²¹ If it must do so again at a low price, per-share value drops, not total value.
• The Mainline settlement ends in 2028 on worse terms. The line is full, but shippers have rail and a producer wanting a lower toll has leverage that a regulator, not a line, would give. My bear takes C$0.4B a year off from 2029, about 2% of EBITDA. The loss in value is smaller than people expect, C$2 a share E (estimate), because the line is one piece of a larger group.
• A permit or court decision takes an asset away. Line 5 is the case in point, and Risks sets out the numbers. It matters because a pipeline company’s equity is a claim on cash flows that are fixed in size and in place.⁷⁵

None of these needs anything exotic. They set my bear case. They also explain why I start from the cash that actually reaches an owner and not from DCF, and why I test how much the value depends on the growth budget.

How I built it

I value the cash that could be paid to common holders after the company funds its own growth. The steps are plain. I start from adjusted EBITDA: C$20.5B for 2026, the middle of the company’s guide, plus about C$0.43B a year from the two crude purchases from 2027, which I put at 10.5 and 9 times EBITDA.⁴²³ Each year EBITDA changes by an organic rate on existing assets, plus the prior two years of growth capital divided by the amount of capital it takes to earn a dollar of EBITDA. I set that at 11 times in my base, which is 9.1 cents on the dollar. It is my estimate. The company does not publish a return on its backlog. The check I could run is that the company’s own guide of about 5% a year on C$10B to C$11B of growth capital implies between 10 and 12 times, and that from 2019 to 2025 capital spending was C$43.7B and the Dominion utilities cost another C$19.1B, against EBITDA growth of C$6.7B, which is about 9.4 times, including maintenance capital and currency C (calculated).⁴³⁶²⁰ I use 11, a little worse than both.

From EBITDA I take 89% in 2027 falling to 85.5% in 2036 for maintenance capital, current tax, minority distributions and the cash I count from equity investments, which is how the 2025 figure of 89.4% is built, with tax drifting up as deferred tax comes due E (estimate).³ Then I take off interest at 5.25% on net debt and C$419M of preferred dividends. That gives DCF. I then deduct growth capital, which starts at C$9.5B and falls to C$5.5B as the backlog is used up, and add the new debt that holds net debt at 5.45 times EBITDA falling to 5.2. What remains is owner cash. I discount it at 9.0% with end-of-year timing, add the December 2026 dividend, and divide by 2,229M shares. Net debt at the end of 2026 is C$114.7B E (estimate): the C$110.1B at 30 June, plus about C$3.4B of dividends and growth spending not covered by H2 DCF, plus C$1.2B for the acquisitions less the stock sale and the KKR cash.⁵²¹²³

Two things in that setup are worth saying out loud. The value barely depends on the growth budget: with C$9.5B of growth every year instead of the fading path, my base is C$73 instead of C$74, and at C$6B every year it is C$73 C (calculated). That is what you would expect if new projects earn about what they cost. The size of the company is bought with the growth, and the value is mostly in the cash flows that already exist. The second thing is that owner cash starts below the dividend (C$3.45 a share in 2027 against about C$4.00) and ends well above it, because the growth budget shrinks. I don’t assume the company will stop spending. I assume the spending earns a fair return, which comes to the same value E (estimate).

What the price implies

At C$69.11 Enbridge has a market value of C$154B (US$110B). With net debt, preferred shares and minority interests the enterprise value is about C$274B, or 13.7 times trailing adjusted EBITDA and 12.0 times trailing DCF per share C (calculated).⁵¹ The multiple of DCF at each year-end since 2016 averages 10.8; it was 13.9 in 2016 and 13.4 in 2017, and between 8.7 and 11.5 in the eight years after C (calculated). So the price is high against recent history, and lower than 2016. The right question is what must be true, so I ask it in reverse.

The first line is the useful one. On my cash flows the market is asking for 9.4%, 0.4 of a point more than I do. The Canadian ten-year bond is 3.84%, so that is a premium of about 5.6 points over the risk-free rate. That could be a reasonable price for C$110B of debt and a business that needs to be funded every year. It could also be a market that thinks growth projects earn less than the company says. The third line shows the same thing in operating terms: if cash conversion is 2.9 points lower than I assume in every year, the price is fair. The fourth line shows how much of the value rests on the years I can see. If I keep my ten years and let growth after 2036 be 0.3%, the price equals my value, so the price does not lean on the far future C (calculated).

What I can’t judge

Two inputs decide this page and I can’t know either. I don’t know what the next C$10B a year of growth capital will earn, because the company does not say. I don’t know what rate of return owners need to demand, because it moves with rates, and the last two years have shown that interest costs on C$110B of debt are the main moving part. So here is the grid. Read my C$74 as one cell in it.

A point on the rate moves my base value by C$10 to C$14: C$88 at 8.0% and C$63 at 10.0%. A change in the return on growth capital from 9.1 to 7.4 cents, my bear, moves it by C$9 at 9.0%. The rate matters more. It is outside the company’s control.

The discount rate

I use 9.0%. The Canadian ten-year yields 3.84% and the US ten-year 4.94%.²⁴²⁵ With Damodaran’s 4.20% implied equity risk premium and a five-year beta of 0.87 for Enbridge against the TSX 60 ETF on month-end closes, the capital asset pricing model gives 7.5% C (calculated); against the S&P 500 the beta is 0.56, which is lower.^2612728 With a beta of one it gives 8.0%. I go higher for two reasons. A measured beta comes from five calm years and doesn’t say what happens to a company with C$110B of debt when long rates move. And the regulators who set the returns on about a fifth of the company’s EBITDA allow 9.21% on equity in Ontario and 9.79% in Ohio, which is their view of what the lower-risk part of this business needs.⁷ So 9.0% sits between the CAPM figure with a beta of one and the regulators’ numbers. It is close to the 8.75% I use on the Constellation Energy page and below the 10.0% I use on Cameco, which has a price it can’t set. The table below shows the answer at other rates.

A cross-check against Enbridge’s own history. Market value plus net debt, divided by that year’s adjusted EBITDA, was between 10.7 and 14.3 at the nine year-ends from 2017 to 2025, averaging 12.2 C (calculated).¹⁶ Today it is 13.2. At my base value the same measure is 13.7, at my bear 10.0 and at my bull 17.8. So my base sits near the top of what the market has paid in nine years, and my bear below all of them. Rates were lower for much of that time, which argues for the base being higher now, but I would not call it conservative.

Other uses of the same dollar

The Canadian ten-year bond pays 3.84% and the US ten-year 4.94%, with no risk to the money R (reported).²⁴²⁵ Enbridge’s dividend alone yields 5.6%, before tax. My base returns 9.9% a year at this price, my bull 15.4% and my bear 2.3%, which is under the dividend yield E (estimate). The closest comparisons on this site are the two energy pages. Constellation Energy returns 7.5% on its base and 2.4% on its bear, with a federal price floor through 2032 behind it and a price 20% above its base value. Cameco returns 2.2% on its base and loses 8.3% a year on its bear, at a price 97% above its base. Those pages use their own rates, 8.75% and 10.0%, and their own cash flows. On my numbers Enbridge is the one of the three priced below its base, and it has the least to lose in the bear: my bear is 41% under the price here, 47% under on Constellation and 83% under on Cameco. What I can’t say is that the same dollar does better here. The bear and bull are my guesses about two things I said I can’t judge.

The margin of safety

• PriceC$69.11Close, Q4 2026 [1]
• Base valueC$74My estimate E (estimate)
• Margin of safety belowC$54set from my bear case C (calculated)

I set the margin of safety from the bear case, because with two inputs I can’t judge a discount to base is no protection. Below C$54, 27% under my base value, my C$41 bear value is at least three quarters of the price paid. The stock last closed below C$54 on 29 August 2024 (C$53.36).¹ At C$69.11 it is above that line, about 28% above, so there is no margin of safety by this rule.

Two different questions

How good is the business, and how good is the price? On the first, this is one of the best-positioned energy businesses in North America: a full oil export line, the gas pipelines into the Northeast and the Gulf, regulated utilities, an investment-grade balance sheet, and a team that makes its guidance. Its weaknesses are a heavy debt load, per-share growth of under 4% a year over ten years, and a dividend that depends on borrowing to keep growing. On the second, at C$69.11 the price is 6% below my base, my bear is 41% under it, and at 12.0 times DCF it is above its ten-year average. That looks like a good business at about a fair price. It is not a good business at a price that protects against error, and for a company with this much debt the second matters more.

Where this could be in 5 and 10 years

These are my values in the page’s own model, in Canadian dollars of the year named. Value at a date is the present value, at that date and at 9.0%, of the owner cash that comes after it, divided by today’s 2,229M shares. Owner cash paid per share is the December 2026 dividend plus all owner cash after growth capital from 2027 to 2036. The return is the yearly rate at which today’s price grows to the table’s cash plus the end-2036 value. I assume no new share issues.⁵²¹ At 1.3960, the base is about US$64 at the end of 2031 and US$72 at the end of 2036 C (calculated).¹⁰

For the base to stand at five years, DCF has to reach about C$6.76 a share by 2031 from C$5.76 now, which is 3.2% a year, below the 5% the company guides, and the Mainline has to be renewed in 2028 as it stands E (estimate). For it to stand at ten years, EBITDA has to reach C$29B, 3.6% a year, and the debt on it C$152B at about 5.2 times. The bull needs 5.5% a year and returns of 11 cents on new capital. The bear needs the opposite on both and a rate near 6% on the debt. The numbers that drive the gap are growth, the return on new capital, taxes and the rate. The most likely way my base is wrong is that returns on growth capital are lower than the company says, at 12.1 times my value falls to the price, and at 13.5 times, my bear’s figure, it falls to C$64.

These are estimates of value, not forecasts of the share price, and the market price can sit above or below value for years.

VIIThe case for the price

What most people miss

Three things cut in Enbridge’s favour and get less attention than the dividend. The Line 5 fight is partly insured by the toll: the 2023 US Mainline settlement sets recovery terms for the Wisconsin relocation and the Straits tunnel, and the company says recoverable Line 5 capital goes into Mainline rate base once in service.⁷⁵ The Mainline has a floor, since the performance band is meant to hold its return between 11% and 14.5% on a deemed 50% equity layer.⁷ And partners are paying for part of the growth: C$736M into the BC pipeline in 2025 and about C$2.7B from KKR and Apollo-managed funds for the Westcoast expansions, which is capital that doesn’t come from selling shares.⁷²¹

The bull case

In plain words: Canadian oil output is growing and the pipelines are full, so shippers will pay for more room; gas demand from power, data centres and LNG is rising; the utilities add customers under regulators who let them earn on what they spend; and the company has met guidance for 20 years while raising the dividend 31 times. With C$41B secured and C$10B to C$11B a year of capacity, about 5% a year of growth after 2026 is a plan, not a hope.⁴³ Greg Ebel said on 31 July that “energy security, reliability, and affordability are more important than ever”.⁴ That is management, which is how I treat it. I found no named outside investor’s view on Enbridge that I could check against its source, so I name none.

Against reality

Today’s numbers support the first half and lag on the second. The Mainline is full and the backlog is C$41B, up from C$39B in February.⁷⁴ But growth so far in 2026 is about 1%: in six months adjusted EBITDA is up 1.1%, DCF up 1.8%, DCF per share C$3.11 against C$3.06, and adjusted earnings per share down from C$1.68 to C$1.61 C (calculated).⁴ To reach the bottom of the C$5.70 to C$6.10 guide the second half needs C$2.59 a share, against C$2.65 in the second half of 2025 C (calculated).⁴³ The 5% is also a step up: the 2023 to 2026 guide for DCF per share was about 3%.³

If the backlog is built on budget at the returns shown, the Mainline is renewed in 2028 on present terms, rates on the debt stay near 5% and no more stock is needed, then C$69.11 is possible and my base of C$74 follows. Today the score is: backlog yes, the other three not yet known.

Multiply it out for the bull, which needs the company’s 5%. New projects earning 11 cents on the dollar and not 9: 40%, my guess. EBITDA growth of 5% for the decade: 40%. Rates on the debt falling to 4.9%: 35%. The Mainline renewed on better terms: 40%. Together that is about 2% E (estimate). They overlap, so perhaps 10%. The 25% I give the bull in my weighted value of C$75 is, if anything, generous.

What a 10x would take. Ten times C$69.11 is C$691, about C$1,540B of market value, or US$1,103B. At today’s 12.0 times DCF that needs DCF per share of C$58 against C$5.76, or about C$128B of DCF on 2,229M shares. By 2036 that is 26% a year for ten years. The nine years in the table above gave per-share DCF a gain of 40%, and ten years of my bull gives 71% C (calculated). If instead the multiple were to double with no growth, a tenfold move would still need five times the DCF. Tenfold moves from this size are very rare and have come from new markets that grew many times over, not from pipeline tolls. Enbridge rents room in pipes whose size is set by Canadian and US supply and demand, and it pays out most of what it earns. Tenfold from here is close to impossible, and I would not build anything on it.

Where I come down

The tolling floors and the recoverable Line 5 capital moved me; without them my bear would be lower. The promise of 5% growth did not, because the first half grew about 1%. What would raise my values is evidence on the one input I can’t see, the return on new capital: each point of EBITDA yield is worth about C$5 a share in my grid E (estimate). At C$69.11 the price is 6% below my base, within the error of my own estimate, and above my C$54 margin-of-safety price.

VIIIRisks, and what would change my view

The three ways this goes badly wrong are at the start of Valuation. These are the rest.

• Rates and refinancing. C$6.7B of debt falls due within a year, and about 9% of the debt floated at the end of 2025.⁵⁷ Every point on the average rate costs about C$1.1B of DCF, 9%, before the tax shield C (calculated).
• Equity. Stock was sold in 2016, 2017, 2023, 2024 and September 2026.⁶²¹ The 10-K says the secured program can be financed on an equity self-funded basis; the September sale was for acquisitions outside it.⁷²¹ I count that as a cost all the same.
• Ohio. The 2025 order wrote off C$330M and cut revenue. The appeal is at the Ohio Supreme Court, and a new case seeking US$163M a year is pending, with a settlement hoped for in 2027.⁷⁴
• Weather and customers. Colder weather raised the Ontario utility’s 2025 EBITDA by about C$159M compared with 2024, net of sharing, so a normal year is worth less.³
• Producers. The Mainline and Regional Oil Sands System depend on Canadian output; the company says the regional system serves about half of Alberta’s oil sands output.⁴
• Transition and policy. The 10-K flags opposition to fossil fuel development, slower demand growth for transport fuel in North America, and a risk to the permits that growth needs.⁷
• Leadership. A new chief executive on 1 January 2027, with the CFO and chair unchanged.⁸
• Accounting. Goodwill is C$36.2B and a regulator’s order can force write-offs, as Ohio did.⁵⁷ These do not change cash, but they change what holders think of the book.

Geopolitical risk, and what it means for the value

Enbridge has no fabs, no export-controlled technology and no state owner, and it uses no pegged currency or variable-interest structure. What it has is a border. Its 2026 circular says the liquids system carries about 70% of Canadian exports to the US and about 40% of US crude imports.⁹ A large part of the earnings, the US gas pipelines, the US utilities and the Gulf Coast docks, is in US dollars while the company reports in Canadian.⁷ The risks are therefore trade terms between two countries, and courts and regulators in the US.

On trade, the Q2 10-Q says the formal review of the USMCA began on 1 July 2026 with the US announcing it would not renew the agreement without changes. The agreement stays in force until 2036 unless ended, and the Supreme Court ruled in February that the President could not impose some tariffs on an emergency basis, while the administration is looking for other routes.⁵ The tolls are mostly fixed and the Mainline is full, so the first cost of a tariff on Canadian oil falls on producers’ netbacks, and Enbridge feels it later through growth. On the courts, the Seventh Circuit decided on 30 July 2026 that Line 5 is in trespass on the Bad River reservation, threw out the public nuisance claim and sent the remedy back to the district court. In April the Supreme Court held that the Michigan attorney general’s case stays in state court because Enbridge filed to move it too late, as reported by Michigan Advance; I have not read the opinion. A separate federal judgment for Enbridge on the state’s powers is on appeal.⁵⁷²⁹

Some of this may be in the price. The USMCA review began on 1 July and the Bad River decision came on 30 July, and the shares fell 14% from July’s high to C$69.11, though I can’t say how much of that was these.¹⁵ A permanent loss of Line 5 is small for value, about C$4 a share, because the line is a few per cent of EBITDA. The severe tariff case is not in the price, and it costs C$11. A Gulf supply shock that lifts oil prices helps Enbridge’s shippers more than it helps Enbridge, since tolls do not follow price, and I have not modelled it. Cyber attacks and sabotage on pipelines are also in the 10-K’s risk factors, and I cannot size them.⁷