American Electric Power Company, Inc. (NASDAQ:AEP) Q4 2023 Earnings Conference Call February 27, 2024 9:00 AM ET

Company Participants

Darcy Reese - VP, IR

Ben Fowke - Interim President and CEO

Peggy Simmons - EVP, Utilities

Chuck Zebula - CFO

Conference Call Participants

Shar Pourreza - Guggenheim Partners

Jeremy Tonet - JPMorgan

Nick Campanella - Barclays

Carly Davenport - Goldman Sachs

Ryan Levine - Citi

Anthony Crowdell - Mizuho Securities

Sophie Karp - KeyBanc Capital Markets

Paul Fremont - Ladenburg Thalmann

Paul Patterson - Glenrock

Operator

Hello and thank you for standing by. My name is Regina and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the American Electric Power Fourth Quarter 2023 Earnings Call. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speakers’ remarks, there will be a question-and-answer session. [Operator Instructions].

I would now like to turn the conference over to Darcy Reese, Vice President of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Darcy Reese

Thank you, Regina. Good morning, everyone. And welcome to the fourth quarter 2023 earnings call for American Electric Power. We appreciate you taking time today to join us. Our earnings release, presentation slides and related financial information are available on our website at aep.com.

Today we will be making forward-looking statements during the call. There are many factors that may cause future results to differ materially from these statements. Please refer to our SEC filings for a discussion of these factors.

Joining me this morning for opening remarks are Ben Fowke, our Interim President and Chief Executive Officer; Chuck Zebula, our Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer and Peggy Simmons, our Executive Vice President of Utilities. We will take your questions following their remarks.

I will now turn the call over to Ben.

Ben Fowke

Well, thank you, Darcy. Good morning and welcome to American Electric Power’s fourth quarter 2023 earnings call. It's great to have a chance to reconnect with you, although I never thought it would be under these circumstances.

As you know the AEP board of directors made a decision to remove Julie Sloat from her duties as Chair, President and CEO. Taking this action was not easy, but the board believes it was in the best interest of AEP and its stakeholders to do so. On behalf of the board and the entire AEP family. I would like to wish Julie well and thank her for all her contributions. I would also like to assure everyone that Julie's departure was not due to any unethical behavior, disagreements of financial policy or because of any violation of AEP’s code of conduct.