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The 25th Fortune World’s Most Admired Companies list suggests that tech giants’ peers respect them as much as ever.

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F500-2021-126-Duke-Energy

Headquartered in Charlotte, N.C., the electric power and natural gas distributor provides electricity to 7.8 million customers in six U.S. states.

For an astounding 13th straight year, Apple claims the top spot in Fortune’s annual ranking of corporate reputation, based on a survey of almost 3,800 executives, directors, and analysts.

This year's Fortune 500 marks the 66th running of the list.

F500-2020-123-Duke-Energy

The Charlotte, N.C.-based electric power and gas distributor provides energy to 7.7 million electric retail customers located in six states, while more than 1.6 million customers in five states receive natural gas distribution services through Duke.

Here are the World's Most Admired Companies for 2019 as ranked in their industries. See who made the list.

This year's Fortune 500 marks the 65th running of the list.

Here are the World's Most Admired Companies for 2018 as ranked in their industries. See who made the list.

This year's Fortune 500 marks the 64th running of the list.

This year's Fortune Global 500 generated $27.7 trillion in revenues and $1.5 trillion in profits.

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This year's Fortune 500 marks the 63rd running of the list.

This year's Fortune Global 500 generated $27.6 trillion in revenues and $1.5 trillion in profits.

This year's Fortune 500 marks the 62nd running of the list.

Business insiders have spoken: Asked which companies they most admire, more than 4,100 executives, directors, and analysts chose these top 50 All-Stars.

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This year's Fortune 500 marks the 61st running of the list. Wal-Mart claims the top spot again. See who made the list.

Global business is back. After limping through a worldwide financial crisis and economic slowdown, the 500 largest companies ranked by revenues shattered all sorts of performance records in 2013: They racked up combined revenues of $31.1 trillion, up 2.5% from 2012, and profits soared 27% to nearly $2 trillion. China’s 95 companies (up from 89 last year) posted $5.8 trillion in revenues. The U.S. has four fewer companies on the list than last year but remains (for now) the country leader, with 128 corporations on the list—including No. 1 Wal-Mart Stores—reporting $8.6 trillion in revenues. 

Wal-Mart stayed on top as its sales crept closer to half-a-trillion dollars. Apple moved into the top five. And UnitedHealth Group continued its steady climb. 

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A utilities giant, Duke Energy’s electric businesses service nearly 9 million customers in the South and Midwest. The natural gas business counts almost 2 million more customers in the Carolinas, Tennessee, Ohio, and Kentucky. Charlotte-based Duke’s power generation runs the gamut, including hydro, coal, nuclear, natural gas, solar, and battery storage power. Duke is currently focused on building more gas-fired generation, renewable energy, and transmission lines to help power the anticipated domestic spike in power demand, including data centers.

Q2 2025

Q1 2025

Q4 2024

Duke Energy (DUK): Company Profile, Stock Price, News, Rankings

legacy

Duke Energy

duke energy

Hello and welcome to the Duke Energy Fourth Quarter and Year End twenty twenty four Earnings. My name is Elliot. I'll be your coordinator today. I would now like to hand over to Abby Motzinger, Vice President of Investor Relations. Please go ahead.

Thank you, Elliot, and good morning, everyone. Welcome to Duke Energy's fourth quarter twenty twenty four earnings review and business update. Leading our call today is Lynn Goode, Chair and CEO along with Terry Sideris, President and Brian Savoy, CSO. Today's discussion will include the use of non GAAP financial measures and forward looking information. Actual results may differ from forward looking statements due to factors disclosed in today's materials and in Duke Energy's SEC filings.

The appendix of today's presentation includes supplemental information along with a reconciliation of non GAAP financial measures. With that, let me turn the call over to Lynn.

Abby, thank you, and good morning, everyone. Today, we announced 2024 adjusted earnings per share of $5.9 finishing within our guidance range. 2024 was a year of great accomplishment and in many ways was defined by our response to hurricanes Helene and Milton. We were moved by our community's outpouring of support and appreciation for our work during these historic storms. We also announced updated guidance today, including a 2025 earnings per share range of $6.17 to $6.42 with a midpoint of $6.30, an $83,000,000,000 capital plan, which drives 7.7% earnings based growth.

This capital represents infrastructure spending driven by growing jurisdictions and underpinned by robust regulatory processes such as integrated resource plans and approved grid investment spending. And finally, the continuation of our 5% to 7% EPS growth rate through 2029 with the potential to earn higher in the range as the years progress. Duke Energy enters the back part of this decade in a position of strength and we're excited about the future. We're committed to delivering strong earnings growth and cash flows for our investors and superior service to our customers and communities. Before we get further into 2025 guidance, let me acknowledge our key achievements in 2024.

Turning to Slide five, we continued our track record of regulatory execution with the approval of $45,000,000,000 of rate based investments. The regulatory work of the last two years minimizes rate case exposure in 2025 and '26. We also advanced generation and transmission through our integrated resource plans and CPCN approvals. And we continue to add solar in Florida with 1,500 megawatts now in service. And finally, I'd like to acknowledge the Piedmont Natural Gas threepeat.

For the third consecutive year, the team earned the J. D. Power number one customer satisfaction ranking for natural gas service in the Southeast. And let me also just take a moment and acknowledge last month's announcement. Effective April 1, Harry will become CEO and President of Duke Energy and Ted Craver will assume the role of independent chair of the board.

Therefore, today will be my last earnings call prior to retirement. It's been an honor to leave this company, and I appreciate everyone who's been on the journey with me. To our employees, thank you for your commitment to our company and customers. To our shareholders, thank you for your investment in Duke Energy. The capital you provide powers our success and makes the work we do possible.

And to the analysts who cover our company, you play a valuable role in the investment community, and I've appreciated your thoughtful research. And to Harry, thank you for being an incredible leader and advisor to me. As many of you know, Harry is a twenty nine year veteran of the company with experience in nearly every facet of our business. Harry raised his hand for every challenging assignment and has led this company to great success thanks to his commitment to our investors, our employees and our customers. With Harry as CEO and a strong experienced leadership team around him, Duke Energy is well positioned to execute the next phase of our business strategy and I'm confident in all that the company will achieve.

So with that, I'd like to turn the call over to Harry.

Thank you, Lynn, for your kind words and for your mentorship over many years. Through your leadership, Duke Energy has become an industry leading fully regulated utility that is ideally positioned for the growth ahead. I'm deeply honored by the confidence the Board has placed in me and the outpouring of support I've received from employees, industry leaders and public officials as well as from many of you in the investment community. It is hard to imagine a more compelling time to lead Duke Energy. We are passionate about our mission to power the lives of our customers and the vitality of our communities.

I look forward to the opportunities ahead with optimism around our strategy, our operating culture and our team. Turning to Slide six, I assume this new role at a pivotal point for our company and industry. We share the new administration's commitment to ensuring the availability of reliable and affordable energy to meet our country's aspirations for technology leadership and economic growth. These priorities align with our business strategy and we look forward to working with President Trump, both parties in Congress and our states to build, operate and protect the critical infrastructure needed to deliver on these goals. To that end, we are executing our all of the above generation strategy to meet growing demand and replace aging infrastructure.

Our diverse mix of new resources includes dispatchable natural gas, which is essential to maintaining reliability and affordability for customers and complements our substantial investments in renewables. In the Carolinas, we have started construction on over two gigawatts of natural gas generation that was approved last year, and we are filing CPCNs for our next round of gas plants in the Carolinas and Indiana this quarter. We secured turbines and gas supply for each of these sites, expediting our ability to connect megawatts to support economic development growth. With our generation investments are accelerating, important grid investments will continue to be a significant portion of our Working with stakeholders across our jurisdictions, we Working with stakeholders across our jurisdictions, we have tailored state specific multiyear investment plans that strengthen the grid and ensure our ability to connect new large load customers. The path forward is clear as we navigate this decade of record infrastructure build, and we remain focused on delivering value to our shareholders while meeting our customers' energy demands now and into the future.

With that, let me turn the call over to Brian.

Thanks, Harry, and good morning, everyone. As Lynn mentioned, our full year adjusted earnings per share of $5.9 was within our 2024 guidance range. For the year, we saw top line growth from rate cases and riders across our jurisdictions, which was partially offset by the impacts of a historic hurricane season. For additional details on 2024 results, please refer to supporting materials in today's news release. Moving to Slide eight.

We set our 2025 EPS guidance range at $6.17 to $6.42

midpoint represents around 7% growth over 2024. This trend is a continuation of the 6% annual growth we've delivered since 2022. Within the Electric segment, constructive rate case outcomes over the past two years will continue to drive results. In January, we implemented our new multi year rate plan in Florida and entered year two of our multi year rate plan in North Carolina. We'll see benefits from the DEC South Carolina rate case and our recently approved Indiana rate case as well as growth from grid riders in the Midwest and Florida.

In addition to rate activity, our plan assumes normal weather and retail sales growth of 1.5% to 2% in 2025. Growth in our Gas segment will be driven by the Piedmont, North Carolina rate case and annual rate mechanisms in South Carolina and Tennessee as well as customer additions and integrity management investments. Finally, we expect results of the other segment to be driven by higher interest expense and modest share dilution to fund our growing capital plan. Turning to Slide nine. Beginning in 2027, we see an acceleration in volumes with annual load growth increasing to 3% to 4% at the enterprise.

Our confidence in this forecast is underpinned by significant economic development projects coming online, particularly in the Carolinas, which we see growing at 4% to 5% over the same period. Our economic development pipeline reflects advanced manufacturing projects across multiple sectors as well as data centers. As a reminder, we take a risk adjusted approach as we evaluate which projects to include in our forecast. We incorporate just a portion of our total pipeline, focusing on those with letter agreements or in very late stage development. We then utilize discrete project level analysis to ensure confidence in when the projects will begin commercial operation and require energy supply.

In the near term, we're planning for annual load growth between 1.5% to 2% at the enterprise. Our forecast is supported by strong residential customer growth, improving industrial activity and the expansion of new and existing businesses across our service territories. Moving to Slide 10. Our five year capital plan is now $83,000,000,000 a 12% increase versus our prior plan. The majority of the increase is driven by generation investments reflected in our IRPs.

These investments ramp up over the five year period as load accelerates and we replace aging infrastructure. In addition, grid investments represent around 45% of our capital plan as we continue to improve the reliability and resiliency of our system. With our updated capital plan, we now expect roughly 7.7% annual earnings base growth through 2029, a 50 basis point increase from

plan. Supporting this growth are efficient recovery mechanisms, which are critical to maintaining a healthy balance sheet, mitigating regulatory lag and smoothing customer rate impacts. The need for infrastructure to support our growing regions is not limited to this five year plan. We have a long runway of investment opportunities that extend well into the next decade. Turning to Slide 11.

As we have demonstrated over many years, our commitment to our current credit ratings and a strong balance sheet will continue to be a top priority. We are targeting 14% FFO to debt by the end of twenty twenty five and expect to improve above 14% over the five year plan. Our long term target provides over 100 basis points of cushion above our Moody's downgrade threshold and over 200 basis points above our S and P downgrade threshold. To support these credit objectives and fund accretive growth, we increased equity funding to $6,500,000,000 over the next five years. This increase in equity funds approximately 40% of our capital plan increase.

We will continue to use our at the market and dividend reinvestment programs to efficiently fund our needs. As Harry mentioned, we've delivered many constructive regulatory outcomes over the past two years. These results enable timely recovery of investments and drive considerable improvement in our operating cash flow. In addition, we continue to see a strong market for energy tax credits. In 2024, we efficiently monetized over $500,000,000 of credits that will benefit customers over time.

Before we open it up for questions, let me close with Slide 12. With a strong track record of regulatory execution, we begin 2025 with confidence in our plan and our commitment to the dividend remains unchanged. We understand its importance to our shareholders and this year marks the ninety ninth consecutive year of paying a quarterly cash dividend. As we look ahead, our robust capital plan, strong customer growth and constructive jurisdictions position us to deliver 5% to 7% growth through 2029 with the potential to earn higher in the range as load growth accelerates in the back end of the plan. We look forward to updating you on our progress throughout the year.

With that, we'll open the line for your questions.

First question comes from Shah Pourreza with Guggenheim Partners. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Good morning. Can you hear me? Good morning.

good morning, morning. So just obviously you guys have pretty good visibility now. The CapEx is updated, financing is updated. You don't have a lot of regulatory uncertainty. Just on the EPS CAGR, Brian, you mentioned this and Lynn mentioned this.

Just higher in the range comments in the prepared, are we just basically guiding towards the top end of that range? And with the credit metric targets you have out there the over 100 bps above Moody's, two hundred bps above S and P. Brian, can you just put a bit of a finer point on a specific target range versus the over language you guys have out there? Thanks.

Yes. I'll start with the EPS, Shar. Thanks for the questions. As we look at our plan and see the load growth accelerating in '27 through '29, Clearly, the opportunity is there to earn the top half of the range. And you're exactly right.

That's what we're alluding to. It's based on the economic development pipeline we have that continues to grow by the day and the ability to serve this growing load. So, we clearly see the 5% to 7% over the five years in the top half in the back end of the plan. On the credit, we're very pleased. We finished 2024 at 13.9% FFO to debt as in spite of the storms that we saw.

We were expecting some pressure from the storms. We saw it, but we overcame it because the operating cash flow in our business is accelerating. And that's based on regulatory outcomes that we've experienced over the past couple of years. As we look out in time, we've guided to above 14%, which gives us over 100 basis points like you mentioned above Moody's downgrade threshold and over 200 in S and P. We feel like that's the right target for now above 14%.

We will come up with specific guidance as the plan progresses.

Okay, perfect. That's what I was trying to get at Brian. So there will be a point in time when we can be a little bit more specific on the range that you target over the long term. That's what I was trying to really get to.

Okay, great. And then just on the load growth, obviously, everyone is focused on the incremental load growth opportunities from hyperscalers, etcetera. The DeepSeek and Stargate stuff has been out there for a few weeks now. Just any change in tone, Lynn and Harry, from your customers and your conversations as we're thinking about spending needs, speed to market etcetera or is it kind of full speed ahead, no pun intended by the way?

Yes. I'll take that one, Char. Yes. We feel very confident in our plan that we shared with you and we have a wealth of opportunities. In our discussions with the hyperscalers, they anticipated efficiency gains, so DeepSeek was not a surprise to them.

They're full speed ahead. They're looking at the fact that these efficiencies may actually increase the demand for AI. So we have not seen any pullback in anything they're planning on. In fact, we've seen a lot more discussions with accelerating some of their work. And speed, as you mentioned, is very important to them.

And it's something that we pride ourselves on in working innovatively on solutions with them to find ways to bring them on quicker, which is what they want. So we'll continue to work with them, but we're not seeing any pullback, in fact, an acceleration in what they're discussing with us.

Yes, a little delay. Sorry. Harry, you might talk about what we see in the near term pipeline. There's a lot of the data centers that are really focused on cloud computing.

Yes, that's a good point, Lynn. The near term data centers that we're having under construction are really associated with cloud computing and expansion there. And then as we move later into the plan, that's where some of the generative AI data centers are coming in and that's when we see the larger load growth.

Perfect. And thanks guys so much. And Harry and Lynn, big congrats on both your Phase IIs. And Lynn, I know we're going to miss you a lot. It's been over twenty years of earnings calls and but it's going to be fun watching you take over board.

We now turn to Julien Dumoulin Smith with Jefferies. Your line is open. Please go

We now move on to Nicholas Campanella with Barclays. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Hey, good morning, everyone. And I'll echo Shar's comments. Congrats to Lynn. I counted the earnings calls. It's over 80.

But, hey, just in the equity that you outlined for this new plan, if you were to do kind of junior sub or hybrid or any type of like equity content like instrument, does that change the equity needs? Or do you just kind of remain do

Yes, Nick, I would just frame the equity a little bit. The equity funding in the context of a company our size is around one percent, one point five percent of the market cap what we need on an annual basis. And you would expect us to look for the most cost effective shareholder friendly solutions to fund that equity as we look through the plan and we're planning on using the ATM and the DRIP. But hybrids have continued to be attractive in the market and you would expect us to look at this and we will.

Thanks. And yes, definitely appreciate in context of the market cap, it's smaller. So another question, just legislation in South Carolina has been a discussion point for many investors. And just curious, I assume none of that's kind of in your plan at this point, if you can maybe detail how it would impact the plan. Are you under earning in South Carolina?

Could legislation in any way change your ability to execute differently on the resource plans you've put out there? Thank you.

Yes, Nick, this is Harry. I'll take that one. We're always pleased to take part in energy policy discussions at our states and South Carolina is no different. This is something that has been going on since last year and is making progress. It's really more tone setting around support for the dual state system that we operate, regulatory timelines as well as the all of the above strategy and support for that.

So we don't anticipate changes to our plans from the legislation, but it will make the tone in South Carolina stronger for us and we support that and continue to work with our policymakers on that front.

All right. Well, thanks a lot. See you soon.

We'll now turn to David Alcaro with Morgan Stanley. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Hey, thanks. Good morning. And Lynn, best wishes with your upcoming retirement and congratulations, Harry.

Let me see. Hey, Brian, just to put you on the spot, we're going to see like is the top end possible in 2027 specifically or Or how are you thinking about it just within the specifics of the five year plan here?

David, we're not going to get that specific on the day, but we do see load growth stepping up in 2027 and that's in our slides. And that's when a lot of these economic development projects that are under construction now will start taking energy and will start serving them. So that's the year where we do see this kind of ratcheting up of growth in on the top line and it does present the opportunity.

Okay, great. That's helpful. I appreciate you're not getting overly precise here with it. But and then could you speak to just how much of a pipeline of data center activity that you're kind of seeing and working on in the background? It sounds like a lot of the growth is even beyond data centers that you're seeing crystallized in the state, which is great to see.

And just curious just the quantum of data center activity that's back there in the pipeline.

Yes, David. We have a wealth of opportunity in not just data centers, but total economic development. We have advanced manufacturing and pharmaceuticals, a very diverse pipeline. Our near term pipeline and advanced stage pipeline is over seven gigawatts and our broader pipeline is at least double that and continues to grow. As Brian mentioned, we take a risk based approach in what we put in our load forecast because we know these loads can move around and the timing of them.

So we're really putting in the load forecast items that are either turning dirt or have letter agreements or near letter agreements. And we continue to work with the ones in the pipeline to bring them forward and get them in the load forecast. And we feel very strongly about our positioning for economic development and future growth, not just in data centers, but in other economic development projects.

Yes. Excellent. Now that's helpful. I appreciate the color. And I was just is it possible that there could be even more upside, I guess, based on the pace of the development that you're seeing in your service territory?

I know you've put obviously a lot of thought into this updated load growth and of course probability weighted it here. But in terms of the pace of or the rate of change that you're seeing, is there potential for further upside over time?

David, we're definitely confident in the plan that we shared with you and we continue to work to bring as much additional load that we can and we focus on making sure that we can serve that load reliably and affordably. Like I mentioned earlier, the speed is important. So how can we speed this up? And we continue to have those discussions with the hyperscalers as well as the advanced manufacturing and other economic development folks.

David, I would say as we look at the pipeline over the last year, it hasn't continued to increase. And if we look out to 2029, for example, 50% of the pipeline is now data centers. So I do think, the hard work of the team and bringing customers to our service territory will not stop and we'll keep you updated along the way on how that translates into growth.

Okay, great. Very helpful. Thanks so much for the

We now return to Julien Dumoulin Smith with Jefferies. Your line is open. Please go ahead.

Hey, good morning team. Can you guys hear me this time? All set?

Hey, excellent. Awesome. Hey, good morning. Congratulations to both of you guys. Nicely done.

And Lynn, all the best. It's been a pleasure over the year.

As they said. Absolutely. Look, maybe just shifting the conversation focus slightly, can we talk a little bit about cost savings?

Just the ability to drive more efficiencies out of the organization? It seems like a potential meaningful year ahead here as you think about the opportunity. Again, maybe a question more for Harry, if anyone. How do you think about the scale of what you could deliver here, especially against the backdrop of what seems like a reinflationary cycle from a variety of different factors? And how that makes you guys relatively competitive?

I appreciate your rates remain competitive against a number of different peers and metrics. But how do you think about that contributing to the backdrop of economic development in that 3% to 4% as well?

Hey, Julien, it's Brian. I'm going to start and Harry is going to come back and add some additional color. But we've been a cost leader in the industry. And over the past many years, leveraging technology, including AI, process improvement and our scale to drive our cost to where they are and you're recognizing that and thank you for that. I will say as our asset base grows to serve a larger customer base, O and M is going to increase.

Duke Energy (DUK) Q4 2024 Earnings Call Transcript

Company Participants