American Electric Power Company, Inc. (NASDAQ:AEP) Q4 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

Julia Sloat: I think that’s a fair characterization. And just as a reminder because Ann wasn’t here when we made these announcements last year. But Paul, you may remember, we took out of the 2022 plan — the 2022 plan, $1.4 billion of equity because we assume that the Kentucky transaction would have closed. We never put that equity back in. And so right now, we’re just kind of waiting to have that particular transaction close. And then we introduced the contracted renewables transaction on top of that. So what you see today is versus what we originally had planned, we had already stripped out $1.4 billion of equity. So that’s already assumed in this plan versus what we originally had when we announced Kentucky. And so as Ann mentioned, what you should anticipate is we’ve already assumed all the process both of these transactions are assumed in the multiyear forecast you have on Page 39.

And that once we close on both of them, we like cash. We like cash coming in the door. So once we close on those, we’ll be able to recalibrate to make sure we’re doing — hitting 2 objectives: number one, make sure that we’re getting to that 15% — 14% to 15% FFO-to-debt and then being able to tweak, meaning otherwise translation reduce any of those equity needs in those future periods. So don’t anticipate us just piping all of that out because we’ve already assumed the Kentucky utilization was in there, but we may have some wiggle room here to take some additional dollars out in terms of equity once we close on the transaction. And so no hidden message there. We’re just wait until we have the dollars, and we’ll be right back to you to be able to take some of those equity needs out assuming we can get the metrics that we need to hit from an FFO-to-debt perspective, and I think we can do it.

Unidentified Analyst: Great. And then moving to Virginia. You guys — or there’s a bill, I think that’s under duration SB 1075, would you expect that to survive, come out of conference and ultimately be adopted? Or I guess, what’s your thought process on what will happen in Virginia?

Julia Sloat: Yes. So here’s what I have. I have that SB 1075 was amended in the house and then we — it was transitioned to a biennial. And then we’re continuing to work with our legislators and the governors to reach some consensus on the language. And if this does pass, what you should anticipate is that AEP or APCo would file its last triennial in 2023, and that would cover the period through 2022. So we’ll see if we can get this across the goal line. I know we’ve got some other competing bills or legislation that is being proposed as well, also looks like a biennial situation.

Unidentified Analyst: Great. And can you break out for 2022, just the contribution from generation?

Julia Sloat: From all of our generating assets or the generation market…

Unidentified Analyst: In the G&M section, so the merchant — in other words, the merchant generation contribution in 2022.

Julia Sloat: Yes. I can give you the renewable part, that was $0.08. I have that off the top of my head. I can give you the — so I’m going to work it a little bit backwards. I give you the retail piece of the business, and that’s not the generation component. So that was $0.05. So then you’ve got, what, $0.13 there of the total earned. We can circle back with you, Paul, and get you that number, though. That would be no problem.

Unidentified Analyst: That would be great. And maybe the last question for me. the income tax changes and other and corporate and other, can you maybe give a little flavor as to what drove those?

Julia Sloat: Hang on one second here. We’re kind of running through my notes because I don’t have that in front of me.