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Alliant Energy Corporation (LNT)

Q3 2007 Earnings Call· Fri, Nov 2, 2007

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Transcript

Operator

Operator

Please standby, we’re about to begin. Thank you for holding,ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to Alliant Energy's Third Quarter 2007Earnings Conference Call. At this time, all lines are in a listen-only mode. I would now like to turn the call over to your host, BeckyJohnson, Manager of Investor Relations at Alliant Energy.

Becky Johnson

Management

Good afternoon. I would like to thank all of you on the calland on the webcast for joining us today. We appreciate your participation. Withme here today are Bill Harvey, Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer,and Eliot Protsch, our Chief Financial Officer, as well as other members of thesenior management team. Following prepared remarks by Bill and Eliot, we will havetime to take questions from the investment community. We issued a news releasethis morning announcing Alliant Energy's third quarter 2007 earnings. Therelease is available on the investors page of our website atwww.alliantenergy.com. Before we begin, I need to remind you that the remarks wemake on this call and our answers to your questions include forward-lookingstatements. These forward-looking statements are subject to risks that couldcause actual results to be materially different. Those risks include among others matters discussed inAlliant Energy's press release issued this morning and in our filings with theSecurities and Exchange Commission. We disclaim any obligation to update theforward-looking statements. At this point, I would like to turn the call over to Bill.

Bill Harvey

Chairman

Thank you, Becky. Good afternoon and thanks for yourcontinued interest in our company. My comments this afternoon are primarilyfocused on updating you on our progress with our generation buildout and otherstrategic initiatives. Later in the call, I will turn it over to Eliot to provide aregulatory update and a more detailed discussion of our quarterly earnings andfinancial guidance. Due to the seasonal nature of our business, the thirdquarter is historically a big contributor to the annual earnings of our utilitybusiness. This year was no exception. Our third quarter results from continuingoperations were $1.05, compared to $0.75 for the third quarter of 2006. Later in the call, Eliot will discuss some of thequarter-over-quarter variance drivers. Suffice it to say, however, we arepleased with the solid financial performance produced this quarter. Moreimportantly, as a result of this strong third quarter results, we have narrowedour consolidated earnings guidance for 2007 to what had previously been the tophalf of our range. As for our utility operations, two of our coal plants wererecently named 2007 best performers by the electric utility cost group. TheEdgewater generating station in Sheboygan, Wisconsin, received the award in thelarge plant category; those stations greater than 250 megawatts and the Lansinggenerating station in Iowa received the award in the small plant category. We are pleased by this recognition of our commitment tooperational excellence and reliability. Moving on to our generation buildout.Last week in Wisconsin we celebrated the official groundbreaking of the CedarRidge wind farm, Alliant Energy's first of many planned rate-based wind farms. We began construction of turbine access roads, foundationsand the substation. This infrastructure work is ongoing and will be completedby year-end. Turbine deliveries are scheduled for the second quarter of nextyear, with turbine erection occurring in the summer of 2008. This 68-megawatt wind farm is expected to be operational…

Operator

Operator

Please stay online. We are experiencing a short interruptionin our program. We will return in just one moment.

Bill Harvey

Chairman

Hello everyone. This is Bill Harvey. Wisconsin is still hereand so is Alliant Energy. We did have a breakdown in telecommunications. Butlet me back up in my prepared remarks just a little and begin with a discussionof an update on proposed sale of our IP&L transmission assets to IPCHoldings. We continue to move forward through the various regulatoryprocesses. In September the Iowa Utilities Board formally allowed the sale tomove forward, which was a major milestone in the process. Recently, the Office of Consumer Advocate has soughtjudicial review of the IUB's decision. We do not expect the judicial review tobe successful or delay the anticipated closing of transaction. But, as youwould expect, we cannot provide any assurances that the judicial review will beresolved in a timely or satisfactory manner. In addition to Iowa we have received approval from theMissouri Commission. We have also made applications jointly with IPC inMinnesota, Illinois, and at the FERC. We expect to receive the Minnesotaadministrative law judge's recommendation this month. The FERC does not have adefined period of time within which to act, however, we are also expectingtheir decision this month. In addition, both IP&L and IPC have made theirHart-Scott-Rodino filings. The FTC acted on behalf of both organizations, andthe investigation was completed in May. The sale of IP&L's transmissionassets is expected to be positive for our customers and our shareowners.Assuming all regulatory approvals are received on a timely basis, we expect tocomplete this transaction by year-end. In closing, I will summarize the key takeaways from thequarter. First, strong sales and improved electric margins drove better thanexpected third quarter results. Second, we are narrowing our earnings guidanceand have increased the midpoint of our consolidated guidance by $0.05. Third,we successfully completed our $400 million share repurchase program. Fourth, substantial progress has been made on theconstruction of the Cedar Ridge wind farm in Wisconsin, which is slated tobegin commercial operation next year. And finally, the regulatory proceedingsrequired to build our coal and wind facilities and to sell our IP&Ltransmission assets are progressing. We appreciate your continued support forour company and now I would like to turn the call over to Eliot.

Eliot Protsch

Chief Financial Officer

Thanks, Bill and thanks to all of you for joining us today.My primary focus will be to provide additional analysis on the quarter as wellas update you on our rate cases and discuss our revised financial guidance. Myremarks pertain exclusively to results from continuing operations. First, as noted in our press release, we have postedsupplemental slides on our website to assist you in your earnings analysis. Youmay want to have these slides available for reference during my remarks. As wewalk from third quarter 2006 to 2007. There are three items that negativelyimpacted third quarter of 2006 earnings, which improved this year. First, $0.07 related to net impacts of weather and weatherhedging, second, $0.07 related to WP&L fuel recovery-related items. Andfinally, Q3 2006 earnings included a $0.05 loss for our New Zealand operations,which have since been sold. Positive EPS drivers for 2007 are as follows: the accretiveimpact of the share buyback was $0.05 per our utility in Q3 2007. In addition,third quarter earnings reflect improved electric margins and a forset benefitfrom the settlement of a federal income tax audit for the period 1999 to 2001.Drilling further into third quarter 2007 utility results compared to 2006. Iwould like to highlight the following. Primarily as a result of increased retail electric salesvolumes, electric margins were approximately $0.07 higher than last year. Wecontinue to experience increased customer usage in general, as well as positiveeffects from the growth in the agricultural processing industry in our serviceterritory. The net impacts of weather and weather hedges were slightlypositive this year as our summer weather hedge functioned as intended. We alsohad a slight pickup from a warmer than normal September which is outside thesummer hedging period. Incentive compensation related expenses were $0.05higher than the same period last year. However, focusing on the right column on the post slide,please…

Operator

Operator

Thank you, Mr. Protsch (Operator Instructions). We'll gofirst to Steven Rountos with Talon Capital.

Steven Rountos - Talon Capital

Management

Good afternoon, everyone.

Eliot Protsch

Chief Financial Officer

Hi, Steven.

Bill Harvey

Chairman

Steven.

Steven Rountos - Talon Capital

Management

I was wondering if you comment on the OCA's request forjudicial review. What is the timing of that? And what are the next steps forthat?

Bill Harvey

Chairman

Well, the process is a relatively traditional judicialreview process. The timing of its review is something that's controlled by thereviewing court, not by some other mechanism. I think the important thing towatch for is whether or not there is any quick action by the court. And, secondly, whether or not there's any action by thecourt relating to any possible request for a stay of the sale. There has beenno such request today and we think the probability of any such request beingsuccessful, if it were made, is very low.

Steven Rountos - Talon Capital

Management

Okay. And then on Nelson Dewey, I think that you hadmentioned that the CapEx has increased because of the need to be able to firebiomass in it as well. Can you give us an idea on what the increase is and howit plays out over the '08 to 2010 timeframe?

Bill Harvey

Chairman

I think in my prepared remarks, I indicated what the totalcapital cost increase was for our share of the facility, but you can think ofit as approximately a $50 million increase in costs. Some of that relates tosite reconfiguration relating to wetlands on the site. Some of it relates to reconfiguration associated with theability to logistically handle the biofuels that will be burned at the plant.And some of it relates to alloy changes in the boiler that will accommodate thecombustion of higher levels of biofuel and what we had originally anticipated.

Eliot Protsch

Chief Financial Officer

Steven, with regard to year-by-year estimates when we fileour 2008 guidance, we will give you our best estimate at that point in time interms of year-by-year expenditures for that plant.

Steven Rountos - Talon Capital

Management

Okay. Thank you very much.

Operator

Operator

(Operator Instructions) We will go next to Steve Fleishmanwith Catapult Partners.

Steve Fleishman - Catapult Partners

Management

Yes, hello.

Bill Harvey

Chairman

Hi, Steve.

Steve Fleishman - Catapult Partners

Management

Could you on the non-regulated businesses in the quarter,could you -- outside of the absence of the New Zealand loss last year, whatwere the drivers at the non-reg generation and the, transport RMT WindConnect?

Bill Harvey

Chairman

Well, the drivers were really twofold. Number one,substantial increase in the earnings associated with the WindConnect businessand the second is the increase in earnings in the non-regulated generationbusiness due to the retirement of debt associated with that business andconsequentially less interest carrying costs.

Steve Fleishman - Catapult Partners

Management

Okay. Are these things that could be ongoing to the pointwhere these businesses maybe start going at a higher run rate than before or isthis kind of some just strong performance in the quarter, do you think?

Bill Harvey

Chairman

Well, the wind connect businesses has been strong. It'sdifficult to predict whether or not that will sustain over the long term. Thenon-regulated generation business, obviously, that debt is gone.

Steve Fleishman - Catapult Partners

Management

Okay.

Bill Harvey

Chairman

So its performance ought to be enhanced over time, butimportantly, the transportation business is benefiting substantially from thetremendous expansion in the ethanol marketplace in Iowa. So, we hope thatbusiness will perform more strongly over time as well. What we expect in thatarea will obviously be reflected in the guidance that we issue in December ofthis year. But I think that's a fair qualitative summary.

Steve Fleishman - Catapult Partners

Management

Okay. And then one last question, what is your currentexpectation for use of proceeds from the transmission sale?

Bill Harvey

Chairman

Right now, our expectation is that we will probably redeploythat to our utility business; reduce a little bit of debt at IP&L.

Steve Fleishman - Catapult Partners

Management

Okay.

Bill Harvey

Chairman

Everybody is still there?

Steve Fleishman - Catapult Partners

Management

Oh, sorry. So you said redeploy the utilities?

Bill Harvey

Chairman

Dividend it up to the parent for redeployment both inreducing debt at IP&L and redeploying the capital program of the utilityand otherwise investing it in short-term interest bearing obligations.

Steve Fleishman - Catapult Partners

Management

Okay. Thank you.

Operator

Operator

Thank you. Ms. Johnson, there are no further questions atthis time.

Becky Johnson

Management

With no more questions, this concludes our call. Thanks foryour continued support of Alliant Energy and feel free to contact me with anyof your follow-up items. A replay of this call will be available throughNovember 9th, 2007 at 888-203-1112 for U.S. and Canada, or 719-457-0820 forinternational callers should reference conference ID 4510812. In addition, an archive of the call and the script of ourprepared remarks will be available on the Investors section of the company'swebsite later this afternoon. Thank you.

Operator

Operator

We thank you for today's participation. That does concludetoday's conference call.