Spire Inc. (NYSE:SR) Q4 2022 Results Conference Call November 16, 2022 10:00 AM ET
Company Participants
Scott Dudley - Managing Director, Investor Relations
Suzanne Sitherwood - President and Chief Executive Officer
Steve Lindsey - Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer
Steve Rasche - Executive Vice President and CFO
Scott Carter - President of Spire Missouri
Adam Woodard - Vice President, Treasurer and CFO, Gas Utilities
Conference Call Participants
Richard Sunderland - JPMorgan
Christopher Jeffrey - Mizuho Securities
Selman Akyol - Stifel
Operator
Good morning. And welcome to the Spire Inc. 2022 Year End Conference Call [Operator Instructions]. Please note, this event is being recorded. I would now like to turn the conference over to Scott Dudley. Please go ahead.
Scott Dudley
Good morning. And welcome to our fiscal '22 fourth quarter and full year earnings call. We issued our earnings release this morning and you may access it on our Web site at spireenergy.com under newsroom. There's also a slide presentation that accompanies our webcast, and you may download that either from the webcast site or from our Web site, which will be found under Investors and then Events & Presentations.
Before we begin, let me cover our safe harbor statement and use of non-GAAP earnings measures. Today's call, including responses to questions, may contain forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Although our forward-looking statements are based on reasonable assumptions, there are various uncertainties and risk factors that may cause future performance or results to be different than those anticipated. These risks and uncertainties are outlined in our quarterly and annual filings with the SEC. In our comments, we will be discussing net economic earnings, which is a non-GAAP measure used by management when evaluating our performance and results of operations. An explanation and reconciliation of this measure to its GAAP counterpart is contained in both our news release and slide presentation.
On our call today is Suzanne Sitherwood, President and Chief Executive Officer; Steve Lindsey, Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer; and Steve Rasche, Executive Vice President and CFO. Also in the room with us today is Scott Carter, President of Spire Missouri; and Adam Woodard, Vice President and Treasurer and CFO of our Gas Utilities.
With that, I will turn the call over to Suzanne.
Suzanne Sitherwood
Thank you, Scott, and good morning, everyone. It is our pleasure to speak with you today about Spire's performance for the fiscal year just completed, to update you on recent developments and to share our outlook for the future. Last year, we remained squarely focused on our long term strategic priorities and commitments while being mindful of the vital role of our natural gas businesses play in ensuring a sustainable energy future. Fiscal 2022 was a year of challenges and opportunities. We collectively tackled both with equal energy. And as we close the year, we delivered for our customers while achieving strong operating performance. We reported earnings for the year of $3.86 per share, reflecting the strong performance in our midstream and marketing businesses. And at our gas utility, we met the headwinds of weather and a lower rate of return in Missouri, with a path for improvement in fiscal 2023. We continued the robust investment in our gas utilities to upgrade infrastructure, drive new businesses and advance our technology. This has led to further gains in safety, system integrity, environmental performance and overall service experience with the 1.7 million homes and businesses we proudly serve. We successfully met important challenges head on, including working to settle the contested issues in our Missouri rate review. We, along with other parties, have filed a proposed agreement. This settlement is subject to Missouri Commission review and approval, but we are pleased by the prospect for a timely resolution to the case.