El Paso Corp. on Friday sold its remaining interests in Enterprise Products Partners LP. for $425 million to EPCO Inc., a privately held company formed by Enterprise’s founder, Dan L. Duncan. The sale includes El Paso’s 9.9% interest and 13.5 million common units in the general partner of Enterprise.

Duncan, who is also chairman of Enterprise’s general partner, now owns 100% of the equity interests and 39.5% (144.2 million) of Enterprise common units.

El Paso merged its affiliate GulfTerra Energy Partners LP with Enterprise last year, creating the second largest publicly traded energy partnership in the United States (see Daily GPI, Dec. 16, 2003). El Paso expects to report a gain of more than $150 million on the sale, which will allow El Paso to exceed its $4 billion mark in assets sold since late 2003.

“This transaction unequivocally demonstrates the continuing commitment of Enterprise’s general partner and its management to the long-term growth prospects of our partnership,” said O.S. Andras, CEO of Enterprise. “Since Enterprise’s initial public offering in 1998, Enterprise’s general partner and its management have consistently supported Enterprise’s growth and the total return prospects for our limited partners.

“No other publicly traded partnership has had the level of support and the economic alignment with limited partners as that provided by Enterprise’s general partner and its management, including the significant support provided by Enterprise’s founder, Dan L. Duncan,” Andras added.

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