(Bloomberg) – Kinder Morgan Inc. emerged as one of the biggest winners of the historic winter storm that paralyzed Texas after the pipeline operator took advantage of skyrocketing energy and price demand during the deadly freeze.
The mid-February storm positively impacted first-quarter results by $ 1 billion, President Kimberly Dang said on Wednesday during a conference call with investors. Kinder revealed a profit of $ 116 million from voluntarily curbing energy use during the disaster, representing an $ 880 million windfall from gas sales.
A Kinder Morgan spokesperson declined to comment on the numbers.
Lone Star state power and utility companies suffered billions of dollars in losses when the Arctic blast rocked the power grid and disrupted gas supplies, pushing prices to unprecedented levels. At the other end of that market, Kinder and drills like Comstock Resources Inc. big profits.
“Our storage assets performed exceptionally well, enabling us to deliver gas to the market during the storm,” said Chief Executive Officer Steve Kean. “These recordings of storage, along with the gas we purchased before and during the event, have enabled us to deliver significant amounts of gas at contractual or prevailing prices.”
Much of the extra gas that Kinder sold went to power generators whose normal suppliers were shut down or obscured as the catastrophe intensified, Kean said.
Kinder net income for the first quarter reached a record $ 1.41 billion, more than double the $ 550 million average according to analyst estimates by Bloomberg. Shares were up 3.8% during out of hours trading in New York.
(Updates with details on earnings in second paragraph.)
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