Northern Oil and Gas, Inc.

successfully integrated our 2021 deals on time and they are performing better than expected. As we mentioned on last quarter's conference call, we are conservative on development timing and the assumptions we utilize in acquiring assets, and we are seeing more production on our assets than anticipated, especially on the Veritas properties. Number three, our diversified model continues to shine. For the quarter, Permian volumes made up approximately 20% of our production volumes with only about two months of Veritas contribution. I would like to reiterate that we want a low leverage diversified capital allocation model, and we're delivering that in spades. Our leverage in this quarter is at a run rate of about 1.1 times, well ahead of schedule, and we believe we're on a path to less than one times in 2022. When this management team came on board four years ago, one of the major goals was to improve and deleverage NOG's balance sheet. We believe that goal has been accomplished and is permanently in the rearview mirror, which will allow further shareholder returns, as I'll discuss next. Number four, shareholder returns. During Q1, we delivered over 40% of our free cash flow back to shareholders in the form of dividends and preferred buybacks, a record percentage, and a record in terms of absolute returns. Even with the strong shareholder returns, we still ended the quarter with less debt than we had forecasted. We also increased and accelerated our dividend plan, which included another 36% increase to the quarterly dividend. Throughout this year, our goal is to keep all options open to deliver more shareholder returns and improve our discounted absolute and relative valuation. As we have previously discussed, we believe we have a premium business model that will continue to provide great returns to our shareholders. As noted in our release, management is recommending another 32% dividend increase next quarter that would take the annual dividend to $1 per annum. The board has also approved a buyback plan for our senior notes, as well as increasing the authorizations for preferred and common stock repurchases. Number five, the future. We are seeing robust organic activity on both our Permian and Williston properties as we approach mid-year. We hope and expect to see development towards the high end of our 48 to 52 well count this year, which should boost exit volumes for 2022 and set us up for significant production and free cash flow growth in 2023. As I mentioned last quarter, we see inclining volumes on our assets throughout this year. Recent severe storms in North Dakota will be a minor blip in April, and while it will flatten out Q2 growth, the trajectory for 2022 is actually materially improving, with accelerating growth throughout 2022. This has allowed us to increase our full-year production guidance. Additionally, ground game activity is booming, and we expect our free cash flow to significantly outperform our prior expectations. Small-scale ground game competition has picked up, but we are getting significant traction in larger-scale wellboard development projects that may be too large for our competitors to handle. If successful, we'll update you as always. Number six, bolt-ons. Legendary World War II General Omar Bradley was famous for saying that amateurs talk strategy, but professionals talk logistics. To that point, we have not done M&A as part of just some pie-in-the-sky strategic thinking. We have done it to definitively increase returns to our shareholders as the results speak to today. The strategic benefits are a residual benefit of smart financial decisions. The number of bolt-on properties coming to market has accelerated dramatically since we last reported, and we're evaluating a robust pipeline. As always, we're evaluating top quality accretive prospects in our core areas. As one would expect, with commodity prices higher and upside convexity for the buyer more limited, we will be cautious in our underwriting approach. Furthermore, you can expect our hedging strategy upon success will be geared towards locking in the majority of the PDP value. I am optimistic we can close on meaningful value-added M&A this year. As I've mentioned previously, we do not expect these acquisitions to require Northern to access the public common equity markets given our current leverage levels. As is typical, I will remind you this is not a cheesy tagline. We take it seriously when we say we are a company run by investors for investors, and I want to thank each and every one of you for taking the time to listen to us today. I'd now like to turn the call over to Adam and Chad to provide more details on operations and financials. Adam?

Thanks, Nick. The first quarter finished high note as elevated activity levels across our entire position have been encouraging and the Permian is leading the way. Completions for the quarter came in above expectations as we added 10.6 net wells to production. The trend in a pull forward of activity remained a theme during the quarter with the acceleration coming from our Williston completions. The Permian assets performed up to expectations with the Veritas asset accounting for roughly 20% of the net additions during the quarter. While completions were above expectations, we also saw the base asset outperform internal production forecasts. Our private operators in both the Permian and the Williston were the main contributors to that outperformance with continued improvements to well efficiency. Our Marcellus assets have also been performing well And we have been encouraged by the shallower declines in connection with the change in well design. With roughly nine months production under our belt, our first completed set of wells are outperforming by 15%. And we expect that outperformance to increase as we gather additional production data. As we look to the second quarter, blizzards in the Williston shut in significant gross volumes during April. However, based on our areas of concentration, and our operators working diligently to bring wells back online, the net effect to NOG was not nearly as impactful. In addition, our Permian assets have helped to partially mitigate the interruption, and we expect to navigate the late winter weather effects moving through the second quarter. On the drilling side, activity levels remain strong. We saw a build in our DMC list which has us sitting with almost 50 net wells in process, up from 42.5 net wells when we entered the quarter. As anticipated, the activity levels during the winter months shifted from the Bakken to the Permian as the Permian made up 45% of our total oil wells in process compared to about a third when we finished the year. Continuing with that theme, the Permian also accounted for two-thirds of the 13.3 net well proposals that we elected to during the quarter. We've been pleasantly surprised with the number of wells being proposed on our large Permian acquisitions and also saw consistent development from our other ground game acquisitions that closed in 2021. In the Williston, as the rig count has jumped to a two year high, AFE activity has risen for the fourth consecutive quarter and elections are up over 250% versus the first quarter of last year. In totality, the acceleration of both the Williston and the Permian provided us with a 40% increase in net well elections quarter over quarter. We will continue with our barbell approach of high quality elections and opportunistic ground game acquisitions. And while there will be monthly variations, we expect our current Williston and Permian assets to grow roughly in balance over the year. We've also been keeping our close eye on inflationary pressures and I've been impressed with the operators that we actively choose to partner with. Per well costs on new proposals remain well within the range of what we are modeling, with average well costs effectively flat quarter over quarter at $7 million a copy. This has not necessarily been the case for some of the other smaller operators that we have been observing through our ground game evaluation process. Many of the deals that we have screened have shown elevated AFE costs and partnering with the right operators during this period of time has been imperative to retaining capital efficiency. On the ground game front, deal flow remains at all-time highs, and despite the commodity price volatility and variability in quality, we have remained disciplined in our approach. During the quarter, we closed 10 deals for 1.3 net wells, 326 net acres, and 73 net royalty acres. The acquisitions were fairly balanced between the Williston and the Permian during Q1. We continue to see some very compelling opportunities in both basins as we move into the second quarter. The larger M&A opportunities continue to come to market, both in formal auctions and off-market sales. No difference in the ground game deals that we evaluate. We're looking for quality assets and seeking to deal with realistic sellers. There remains a concentration of quality non-op deals in both the Permian and the Williston, and we're currently screening a number of them. Operators have also been approaching us on potential partnerships, and to the extent we can put something together that is mutually beneficial, we will remain opportunistic on that front. Discipline and creativity are essential in this environment, and we are focused on layering in quality assets only to the extent that they are accretive to the enterprise. The duty of getting done what we were able to last year with over $800 million in acquisitions is that we don't have to do anything and can let the assets we've tucked in do the work for us. With that, I'll turn it over to Chad.

Thanks, Adam. I'll start by reviewing some of our key first quarter results, which was the strongest quarter in company history. Our Q1 average daily production increased 11% sequentially over Q4, and increased 85% compared to Q1 of 2021. Our adjusted EBITDA was 256.6 million, up 46% over last quarter, and our free cash flow more than doubled to 146 million compared to last quarter. Both metrics were well ahead of Wall Street analysts and internal expectations. Our adjusted EPS was $1.58 per share in Q1, well above consensus estimates. Oil differentials were better than expected in Q1 and came in just under $4 per barrel due to strong Bakken pricing and having more barrels weighted towards the Permian, which has a sub $2 oil differential. Gas realizations continue to remain strong in Q1, but I wanted to point out as higher gas prices persist and the ratio with natural gas liquid prices tighten, we would expect our gas realizations to fall back in line with our guidance. Lease operating costs were $54.5 million in the first quarter, or $8.50 per BOE, effectively flat on a per-unit basis compared to the fourth quarter and towards the bottom end of our guidance. As I mentioned on our last call, specifically related to our firm transport commitments on our Marcellus assets, that LOE would be elevated in the second quarter as we make any required payments compared to our annual production expense guidance. Cash G&A adjusted for one-time acquisition costs related to our Veritas acquisition was 86 cents per BOE. Capital spending for the first quarter was 85.6 million, excluding non-budgeted corporate acquisitions, which was below street expectations despite a pull forward in completion activity and additional ground game opportunities in Q1. Our Williston Basin spending made up 60% of the total capital expenditures for the quarter. The Permian made up 35%. The Marcellus made up 4%, and other items made up the remainder. The balance sheet is in great shape. We've paid off nearly $85 million on the revolver after closing the Veritas acquisition in late January. We currently have approximately $361 million drawn on the revolver, leaving approximately $390 million in availability. Given the cash flow we expect to generate, we forecast our revolver to be undrawn in Q1 of next year. although that could certainly move depending on commodity prices, how we use our free cash flow, and other factors. As we finalize our spring redetermination, our current asset base would support a substantially higher borrowing base should we desire more liquidity. On the hedging front, we've opportunistically added volumes north of $80 since our last report, mostly to fill our targets in 2023 and 2024 and to top off volumes from our Veritas acquisition. We continue to target hedging 60% to 65% of production on a rolling 18-month basis with select longer-dated hedging tied to corporate acquisitions. With respect to updated 2022 guidance, our production guidance is up 1,000 BLE per day to a range of 71,000 to 76,000 BLE per day. We expect our production to ramp as we move through the year and exit close to the higher end of our range. We will see some slowing of growth at the beginning of Q2 due to severe storms in North Dakota, but expect a strong catch up as we enter the third quarter. As a reminder, Q1 is typically our slowest quarter, so in terms of the cadence of our capital spend, we expect them to be more weighted towards the last three quarters of the year. As I mentioned earlier, oil differentials are better than expected, so we're updating our guidance to $5.25 to $6. This outlook should generate more than $425 million in free cash flow after our preferred stock dividend and would result in modestly increased production volumes and consistent growth in our common stock dividend. As Nick mentioned, the steady volume ramp we expect throughout 2022 also bodes well for a strong setup for 2023. With that, I'll turn the call back over to the operator for Q&A.