유니틸(UTL) 2026년 3분기 실적 발표회: 유틸리티 마진 상승 속 가이던스 재확인

핵심 요약

• 유니틸(Unitil Corporation)은 2026년 1~3분기(9개월) 조정 순이익이 3,830만 달러(주당 2.12달러)를 기록했다고 발표했습니다. 조정 주당순이익(EPS)은 2025년 동기 대비 0.09달러(4.4%) 증가했습니다.
• 경영진은 2026년 EPS 가이던스를 중간값 3.28달러를 포함해 3.20~3.36달러로 재확인했으며, 5~7%의 장기 이익 성장 목표를 유지했습니다.
• 전기 부문 조정 매출총이익은 배전 요금 인상에 힘입어 11.1% 증가한 9,600만 달러를 기록했습니다.
• 가스 부문 조정 매출총이익은 요금 인상, 고객 수 증가, 추운 겨울 날씨, 메인 내추럴 가스(Maine Natural Gas)의 기여에 힘입어 12.8% 증가한 1억 5,190만 달러를 기록했습니다.
• 유니틸은 메인 내추럴 가스 및 뉴햄프셔 수도 자산 인수건에 대한 영구 자금 조달을 완료하고, 10월에 관련 기간 대출(term loan)을 전액 상환했습니다.
• 2030년까지 진행되는 회사의 5개년 자본 투자 계획은 약 12억 달러 규모로, 이전 5개년 계획보다 24% 높게 유지되고 있습니다.

핵심 재무 데이터

사업 및 운영 실적

전기 부문 조정 매출총이익은 요금 인상으로 인한 1,030만 달러의 이익을 얻었으나, 연방에너지규제위원회(FERC) 송전 매출의 일회성 감소(70만 달러)로 일부 상쇄되었습니다. 요금 인상 요인에는 2026년 5월 1일 자로 발효된 유니틸 에너지 시스템즈(Unitil Energy Systems)의 1,300만 달러 규모 확정 요금 인상 결정, 피치버그(Fitchburg)의 성과 기반 요금 조정, 자본 트래커 매출 증가가 포함됩니다. 모든 전기 고객에게는 디커플링 요금제(Decoupled rates)가 적용되고 있습니다.

가스 부문 조정 매출총이익에는 요금 인상 및 고객 수 증가에 따른 1,580만 달러와 추운 겨울 날씨로 인한 140만 달러가 반영되었습니다. 메인 내추럴 가스는 1~3분기 동안 1,050만 달러를 기여했습니다. 유니틸은 주로 메인 내추럴 가스 인수를 통해 전년 동기 대비 약 6,500명의 가스 고객을 추가했습니다. 2026년 9월 30일 기준 전체 가스 고객의 약 52%가 디커플링 요금제를 적용받고 있었습니다.

운영 및 유지보수 비용은 유틸리티 운영비 증가(510만 달러)와 인건비 및 기타 비용 증가(380만 달러)로 인해 820만 달러 증가했으며, 인수 관련 비용 감소(70만 달러)로 일부 상쇄되었습니다. 증가분 중 메인 내추럴 가스와 아쿠아리온 뉴햄프셔 법인이 각각 390만 달러와 120만 달러를 차지했습니다.

아쿠아리온 워터 컴퍼니 오브 뉴햄프셔(Aquarion Water Company of New Hampshire) 및 아베나키 워터 컴퍼니(Abenaki Water Company) 인수는 6월 30일에 완료되어, 요금 기반의 약 1.2배 수준에서 약 11,000명의 고객을 추가했습니다. 경영진은 이번 인수가 2026년 실적에 중립적(Earnings-neutral)일 것으로 예상한다고 밝혔습니다. 또한 유니틸은 메인 내추럴 가스의 통합을 완료하고 모든 잔여 전환 서비스를 종료했습니다.

유니틸의 지능형 검침 인프라(AMI) 구축은 계획대로 진행 중입니다. 회사는 2025년 매사추세츠주에서 도입을 완료한 후, 2027년 말까지 뉴햄프셔주에서 계량기 교체를 완료할 것으로 예상하고 있습니다.

경영진 가이던스

경영진은 2026년 EPS 가이던스를 중간값 3.28달러를 포함해 3.20~3.36달러로 재확인했습니다. 또한 회사는 5~7%의 장기 이익 성장 목표와 6.5~8.5%의 장기 요금 기반 성장 가이던스를 유지했습니다.

2030년까지의 현재 자본 투자 계획은 총 약 12억 달러 규모입니다. 여기에는 뱅거 내추럴 가스(Bangor Natural Gas)와 메인 내추럴 가스를 합쳐 약 6,500만 달러, 아쿠아리온 뉴햄프셔 법인에 약 3,300만 달러가 포함되어 있습니다. 경영진은 투자 계획의 대부분을 영업활동 현금흐름으로 충당하고, 나머지는 부채와 자본의 혼합을 통해 조달할 것으로 예상하고 있습니다.

리스크 및 주시해야 할 사항

노던 유틸리티스(Northern Utilities)의 확정 요금 인상안은 여전히 규제 절차가 진행 중입니다. 뉴햄프셔주에서 유니틸은 980만 달러의 확정 요금 인상을 요청했으며, 2026년 6월 1일 자로 550만 달러의 임시 요금이 발효되었습니다. 경영진은 기술 회의, 이해관계자 증언 및 합의 회의를 거쳐 2027년 4월 1일에 확정 요금이 발효될 것으로 예상하고 있습니다.

메인주에서 노던 유틸리티스는 1,040만 달러의 요금 인상을 요청했습니다. 회사는 10월 27일에 반박 증언을 제출했으며, 관련 절차가 계속 진행되고 있습니다.

유니틸의 아쿠아리온 워터 컴퍼니 오브 매사추세츠(Aquarion Water Company of Massachusetts) 인수 추진안은 구속력이 없는 의향서(LOI)의 적용을 받습니다. 경영진은 매사추세츠주 기본 요금 사건이 만족스럽게 마무리된 후에만 거래가 진행될 수 있으며, 최종 명령은 2027년 하반기에 나올 가능성이 있다고 밝혔습니다.

2026년 1~3분기 동안 증가한 운영비, 감가상각비, 상각비 및 세금은 인수, 요금 인상, 고객 수 증가, 추운 날씨로 인한 이점을 일부 상쇄했습니다.

실적 발표 전화회의(컨퍼런스 콜) 전문

전체 실적 발표 컨퍼런스 콜 녹취록

경영진 발표

Operator

Good day, and thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Q3 2026 Unitil Earnings Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] Please be advised that today's conference is being recorded.

I would now like to hand the conference over to your speaker today, Christopher Goulding, Vice President of Finance and Regulatory. Please go ahead.

Christopher Goulding

Good afternoon, and thank you for joining us to discuss Unitil Corporation's Third Quarter 2026 Financial Results. Speaking on the call today will be Tom Meissner, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer; and Dan Hurstak, Senior Vice President, Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer. Also with us today are Bob Hevert, President and Chief Administrative Officer; and Todd Diggins, Chief Accounting Officer and Controller.

We will discuss financial and other information on this call. As we mentioned in the press release announcing today's call, we have posted information, including a presentation, to the Investors section of our website at unitil.com. We will refer to that information during this call.

Moving to Slide 2. Some of the statements made during this call may be forward-looking. These statements are based on management's current expectations and are subject to risk and uncertainty, which may cause the actual results to differ materially from forecasts and projections. We undertake no obligation to update or revise any of these statements. Additional information about the various factors that may cause actual results to differ and our explanation of non-GAAP measures and how they reconcile to GAAP measures is contained within our news release, the slides we posted for this call, and in our most recent 10-Q and 10-K.

With that, I will now turn the call over to Chairman and CEO, Tom Meissner.

Tom Meissner

Great. Thanks, Chris. Good afternoon, everyone, and thanks for joining us today.

Beginning on Slide 3. Today, we announced adjusted net income of $38.3 million or $2.12 per share for the first 9 months of the year. Year-to-date, results increased $0.09 per share or 4.4% compared to the first 9 months of 2025, reflecting disciplined execution of our operating and strategic priorities and our long-standing commitment to delivering safe, reliable and affordable service to our customers.

The June 30 closing of our acquisitions of Aquarion Water Company of New Hampshire and Abenaki Water Company marked a key strategic milestone, diversifying our regulated utility portfolio and expanding our customer footprint across the state. I'm pleased to share that the transition has been seamless. Our customers continue to receive the same high level of service and reliability that they did before the change in ownership.

More recently, we completed our integration of Maine Natural Gas just last week and have ended all remaining transition services. We've now fully integrated Maine Natural Gas into our existing utility operations as we did with Bangor Natural Gas last year. As Dan will cover in greater detail, we also completed the permanent financing for our acquisitions of Maine Natural Gas and the New Hampshire water companies and repaid the term loans that have been used to finance those transactions.

Shifting now to our regulatory agenda. We continue to make steady progress on our Northern Utilities gas rate cases in both Maine and New Hampshire, which are moving forward as expected. Dan will walk through the details of those cases later in the call. On the electric side, our implementation of a new advanced metering infrastructure, or AMI system, remains firmly on track. This new metering system incorporates state-of-the-art smart meters that can provide near real-time information to customers, enabling improved decision-making and grid optimization. We completed the implementation of this technology in Massachusetts last year and expect to complete the meter replacement in New Hampshire by the end of 2027.

Looking ahead, we are reaffirming our 2026 guidance of $3.20 to $3.36 per share, with a midpoint of $3.28. We also reaffirm our long-term earnings growth of 5% to 7%.

Turning now to Slide 4. We recently released our 2026 corporate responsibility report and remain on track to reduce company-wide direct greenhouse gas emissions by 50% by 2030 and to be net zero by 2050. Through 2025, we have reduced our Scope 1 emissions by approximately 19%. An element of the report I'd like to highlight is the direct measurement of fugitive methane emissions. These emissions historically accounted for over 80% of our Scope 1 emissions when estimated using the EPA Subpart W emission factors. These represented our largest source of direct operational emissions.

To improve accuracy, we are implementing a measurement informed inventory methodology that uses direct site-specific measurements to develop a more reliable and actionable accounting of our greenhouse gas footprint. As part of this, we are now directly measuring our natural gas emissions using advanced mobile leak detection technology and have found that our pipeline emissions are 91% lower than previously estimated. In addition to providing a more accurate accounting of our greenhouse gas footprint, this technology allows us to identify, prioritize and eliminate the remaining sources of fugitive emissions.

We are also continuing to reduce methane emissions by aggressively replacing all leak-prone pipe in our system. I'm pleased to highlight that over 98% of our gas systems are now constructed of plastic or cathodically protected steel pipe, and we expect to complete the replacement of all remaining leak-prone pipe by 2035.

Turning to Slide 5. As I already mentioned, our acquisitions of Aquarion Water Company of New Hampshire and Abenaki Water Company closed on June 30. Upon closing, we added almost 11,000 customers at an attractive multiple of approximately 1.2x rate base. As part of the transaction, we entered into a 5-year operating and transition services agreement with the Aquarion Water Authority to ensure a seamless transition to Unitil's ownership and operation. Integration efforts are well underway, and we expect to assume responsibility for most operating and corporate services prior to the agreement's expiration date. As noted previously, we expect this acquisition to be earnings neutral in 2026.

Also, as we mentioned on our last call, we've entered into a nonbinding letter of intent with Eversource Energy to purchase the Aquarion Water Company of Massachusetts. That transaction can move forward after the satisfactory conclusion of a base rate case in Massachusetts, which is expected to be filed around or after mid-November. Based on this time line, there could be a final order in that case in the second half of 2027.

With that, I'll now pass the call over to Dan, who will provide greater detail on the quarterly and year-to-date results.

Daniel Hurstak

Thank you, Tom. Good afternoon, everyone. I'll begin on Slide 6. As Tom mentioned, we announced adjusted net income of $38.3 million or $2.12 per share for the 9 months -- for the first 9 months of 2026, representing an increase of $4.8 million in adjusted net income or $0.09 per share compared to the same period in 2025. We are reporting adjusted earnings that exclude transaction costs related to our gas and water acquisitions as those costs are not indicative of the company's ongoing costs and operations. These results for the first 9 months were supported by the earnings contributions from our recently acquired companies in addition to higher distribution rates and customer growth, partially offset by higher operating expenses.

Turning to Slide 7. I will discuss our electric and gas adjusted gross margins and water revenues. Beginning with our electric operations, for the first 9 months -- for the 9 months ended September 30, 2026, electric adjusted gross margin was $96 million, an increase of $9.6 million or 11.1% as compared to the same period in 2025. This increase was driven by higher rates of $10.3 million, partially offset by a nonrecurring reduction of FERC transmission revenue of $0.7 million. Higher rates were primarily supported by the Unitil Energy Systems permanent rate award of $13 million, which took effect May 1, 2026, as well as a Fitchburg performance-based rate adjustment and higher capital tracker revenue. As noted during prior calls, all electric customers are under decoupled rates, which eliminates the dependency of distribution revenue on the volume of electricity sales.

Moving to gas operations. For the 9 months ended September 30, 2026, gas adjusted gross margin was $151.9 million, an increase of $17.2 million or 12.8% compared to the same period in 2025. This increase reflects higher rates and customer growth of $15.8 million and colder winter weather of $1.4 million. Maine Natural Gas contributed $10.5 million to gas adjusted gross margin through the first 9 months of 2026. The temporary rate award of $5.5 million for Northern Utilities New Hampshire division, which took effect June 1, 2026, also contributed to the higher margin. The company added approximately 6,500 new gas customers compared to the same period in 2025, with the majority of these new customers being attributable to the acquisition of Maine Natural Gas. As of September 30, 2026, approximately 52% of the company's gas customers were under decoupled rates.

Moving to water operations. For the 9 months ended September 30, 2026, the Aquarion New Hampshire companies contributed $3.1 million to operating revenue.

Moving to Slide 8. We provide an earnings bridge comparing the results of the first 9 months of 2026 to the same period in 2025. As I just discussed, the combined adjusted gross margin for our electric and gas divisions and water revenues increased $29.9 million and reflect the contributions of Maine Natural Gas and the Aquarion New Hampshire companies, higher rates, colder winter weather and customer growth.

Operation and maintenance expenses increased $8.2 million due to higher utility operating costs of $5.1 million and higher labor and other costs of $3.8 million, partially offset by lower acquisition costs of $0.7 million. This increase included $3.9 million and $1.2 million related to Maine Natural Gas and the Aquarion New Hampshire companies, respectively.

The increase in depreciation and amortization expense and taxes other than income taxes reflect higher levels of utility plant in service and higher amortization of recoverable storm costs as well as expenses associated with Maine Natural Gas and the Aquarion New Hampshire companies.

Moving to Slide 9. As Tom noted earlier, our Northern Utilities rate cases are progressing well in both New Hampshire and Maine. Starting with New Hampshire, on April 1, 2026, we filed a petition for a permanent rate increase of $9.8 million. And on June 1, 2026, temporary rates of $5.5 million took effect. We have proposed a multiyear rate plan with 2-step adjustments to recover all 2026 and 2027 system investments. The rate proposal includes the continuation of revenue decoupling, but similar to our New Hampshire electric case, we have proposed a decoupling methodology change from a revenue per customer model to a total authorized revenue target. The first round of technical sessions has concluded and intervenor testimony is due November 19. Settlement conferences are scheduled in early 2027, with permanent rates taking effect April 1, 2027.

Turning to Slide 10. The Northern Utilities Maine rate case, which was filed on June 1, 2026, includes a proposed rate increase of $10.4 million. The revenue requirement in this case is based on a historical test year with adjustments to forecast rate base, revenues and expenses through the rate effective year. This approach is designed to reduce earnings attrition and is consistent with the revenue requirement approach approved in the company's prior case. We submitted rebuttal testimony on October 27. We look forward to working with all stakeholders through these proceedings, and we'll provide additional details regarding the progress of these cases on future calls.

Moving to Slide 11. As noted during our previous earnings call, our current 5-year capital investment plan through 2030 totaled approximately $1.2 billion which is an increase of 24% over the previous 5-year plan. This plan includes approximately $65 million for Bangor Natural Gas and Maine Natural Gas collectively and approximately $33 million for the Aquarion New Hampshire companies. Rate base increased $0.2 billion or 14.9% compared to the same period in 2025, and supported by the acquisition of Maine Natural Gas and the Aquarion New Hampshire companies. Over the past 5 years, rate base growth has averaged 9.5%, which is above our long-term guidance of 6.5% to 8.5%. As we have in the past, we intend to discuss our updated 5-year investment plan during the fourth quarter earnings call.

Turning to Slide 12. Our financial profile is strong and balance sheet strength remains a top priority. Our dividend payout ratio target range remains at 55% to 65% and our most recent FFO to debt ratio according to S&P was 17%, which is squarely in the middle of our long-term FFO to debt target range and well above our downgrade thresholds. We have successfully executed our 2026 financing plan, including the issuance of $200 million of long-term debt in the private placement market at a weighted average interest rate of 5.76%. In addition, to date, we have issued $27.3 million of equity through our ATM program.

I'm also pleased to report that in October, we fully repaid both tranches of the term loan utilized to finance the acquisitions of Maine Natural Gas and the Aquarion New Hampshire companies. The repayment was primarily funded through proceeds from equity issuances and long-term debt. With the term loan now fully repaid, we consider these operating companies to be fully financed with permanent capital.

Moving forward, we continue to expect cash flow from operations to fund the majority of our investment plan, with the remaining amount coming from a balanced mix of debt and equity.

I will now turn the call back over to Tom.

Tom Meissner

Great. Thanks, Dan. Ending now on Slide 13. We are on pace for another year of successful execution of our strategic priorities. Our value proposition remains the same: investing in low-risk regulated assets that generate stable cash flows while ensuring our customers receive outstanding service and reliability. We look forward to sharing more about our progress and our longer-term outlook during our year-end earnings call.

With that, I'll pass the call back to Chris. Thank you.

Christopher Goulding

Thanks, Tom. That wraps up the prepared material for this call. Thank you for attending. I'll now turn the call over to the operator, who will coordinate questions.

Operator

[Operator Instructions] I'm showing no questions at this time. This concludes our question-and-answer session and today's conference call. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.