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Summary Dividend history is incredibly stable – 3 or 4% annual raises for more than a decade. Market area (Carolinas and Tennessee) is one of the bright spots in the United States. Shares won’t double overnight, but they don’t have to in order to reward shareholders well. Piedmont Natural Gas (NYSE: PNY ) is a large, pure-play natural gas distribution company with a wide berth of operations across the Southeastern United States. The utility has been growing steadily, with earnings and the dividend tracking along at nearly 5%/year for the past twenty years. Consistency has been the name of the game here. This measured growth has been attributable to the favorable rate environment along with population growth strength in the Southeast coupled with the buildout of pipelines surrounding the Marcellus/Utica shale formations in the Northeast. Natural gas development and production in the United States has been and continues to be incredibly strong, yielding abundant supply and relatively stable pricing for gas utilities like Piedmont Natural Gas, especially over the past five years. This strong, consistent operating performance has yielded shares that have been less volatile and consistently outperformed the broader utility index. Will the future be as strong as the past? Operating Results Revenue is down, as has been the case for many natural gas utilities. This is because utilities dealing with lower natural gas prices have to pass the vast majority of the associated cost benefits passed along to consumers in the form of lower utility bills. Excess consumer demand from cheap energy rarely offsets the associated drop in revenue. Further compounding top-ine issues, weather has been at best normal and at worst seasonally warm in the company’s service areas. Decoupling agreements with the utility commission and strong local population growth have done their best in managing to keep growth flat. The company’s small but highly profitable non-regulated businesses have also done well, helping to improve overall operating margins over the 2011-2015 timeframe. (click to enlarge) Piedmont continues to invest significantly in its pipeline infrastructure through capital expenditures. This has continued to result in cash flow deficits, most obviously in 2013/2014. The company notes that it is pushing for new regulatory mechanisms such as IMR tariffs and accelerated rate requests to allow quicker recovery of its cash outlays. The majority of these initiatives went into place in 2013 and the company has made significant strides in getting back to cash flow neutral between its operating and investing activities. Unfortunately the shortfalls in 2013 and 2014 almost doubled long-term debt from $675M in 2012 to nearly $1.4B today. At 3.3x net debt/EBITDA, however, the company is only moderately leveraged and will have no problem covering interest expense on this cheap fixed-rate debt (blended rate is 3.85% fixed rate). While negative consistent overspending in the cash flow statement is generally a sign of mismanagement, in this case it was simply the case of a company investing in its non-utility power generation service delivery projects. Going forward, I expect cash flow shortfalls to be small and investors need not be concerned yet. Conclusion I view Piedmont Energy as an excellent choice in its peer group compared to overvalued alternatives like Atmos Energy (NYSE: ATO ) ( analyzed here ) or lower yielding options like Southwest Gas (NYSE: SWX ) ( analyzed here ). Dividend growth has been incredibly consistent, plugging along at either 3 or 4% increases every year for more than a decade. At a 3.22% yield as of today, the income being thrown off isn’t anything to sneeze at either. Investors might find themselves falling asleep if they hold the stock in their portfolios. For income investors, that is quite often a good thing rather than a bad thing. While I wouldn’t go running to pick up shares at current levels, current shareholders are likely quite happy with the results they’ve been getting and will likely continue to get. I’m not going to disagree with that sentiment. If you’re long, keep on holding and enjoy what is likely to be one of the most stable companies investors have access to in publicly-traded markets. Share this article with a colleague Scalper1 News
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