ONEOK fourth-quarter profit rises on higher demand, expects higher 2025 earnings

Adds details from conference call to Monday's story in paragraphs 5 to 7

Feb 24 (Reuters) - Pipeline operator ONEOK OKE.N forecast annual income growth of about 11% and reported a 34.2% rise in fourth-quarter profit on Monday, helped by higher demand and accretive contributions from the EnLink acquisition.

In November, the company said it would buy the remaining shares of EnLink Midstream for $4.3 billion, following its acquisition of a 43% controlling interest in the peer from Global Infrastructure Partners for about $3.3 billion.

The company also reported a 3% growth in the Rocky Mountain region natural gas liquids (NGL) raw feed throughput volumes and a 4% increase in crude oil volume shipped.

Its quarterly core profit from the NGL segment was up 13.5% at $696 million from a year earlier, while its quarterly core profit from the refined products and crude segment was up 42.2% at $603 million.

The company, on a conference call on Tuesday, said its natural gas pipeline segment's assets are well positioned to benefit from industrial demand growth driven by data centers, LNG exports and ammonia facilities.

The increasing popularity of advanced artificial intelligence tools, such as OpenAI's ChatGPT, has been driving the need for high-performance data centers capable of processing vast amounts of data, boosting demand for electricity.

"Our newly acquired assets in Louisiana provide direct connectivity to major LNG exporters and industrial customers. They are off to approximately 30 potential power plant expansion projects across our footprint," a company executive said on the conference call.

The company now expects current-year net income between $3.21 billion and $3.69 billion, the midpoint of which was up about 11% from last year. It also expects annual capital expenditure between $2.8 billion and $3.2 billion.

The Tulsa, Oklahoma-based company reported net income attributable of $923 million, or $1.57 per share, for the quarter ended December 31, compared with $688 million, or $1.18 per share, a year earlier.