Edison International (NYSE: EIX) swung to a net income of $345 million or $1.06 per share for the fourth quarter 2016 compared to a net loss of $79 million or $0.24 loss per share in the fourth quarter 2015. Meanwhile, for the full year net income increased 28.5% to $1.31 billion. Core earnings stood at $3.97 per share, at the high end of company’s guidance range mainly driven by lower operations and maintenance costs. On the other hand, total operating revenue for the quarter stood at $2.88 billion compared to $2.34 billion in the year-ago quarter.
For the fourth quarter, Edison International Parent and Other reported higher losses by $16 million in its continuing operations compared to fourth quarter 2015. This increase consisted of $4 million of higher core losses indicating lower revenue from Edison Capital’s affordable housing investment portfolio, partially offset by lower corporate expenses. The remaining loss is linked to the non-core income related to the fourth quarter 2015. As a result, Edison stock is trading subdued this morning and fell over 0.3% on Feb 22nd, 2017 (as of 9:41 AM EST; Source: Google finance).
In December 2016, Edison increased their dividends by $0.25 per share for the third consecutive years leading to 13 years of annual dividend increases. Looking ahead, the company believes it still more room of opportunity to grow dividend toward the high end of target payout range. Based on the midpoint of 2017 SCE earnings guidance, EIX is at 49% of payout target out of the 45% to 55% of SCE earnings.
Looking ahead, the company announced basic and core earnings guidance of $4.04 to $4.24 per share for 2017. Moreover, the company expects further O&M cost savings that will be returned to customers starting in 2018 under SCE’s GRC filing. In January, Southern California Edison and the other investor-owned utilities collectively proposed accounted for $573 million out of the total $1 billion of investment proposed in the area of transportation electrification to complement the passenger vehicle pilot programs now underway.
Edison stock price has risen 22.8% in a year (source: Google Finance). Recently, Zacks Investment Research upgraded shares of Edison International from a sell rating to a hold rating, while Barclays PLC cut their price target on shares of Edison International from $77.00 to $76.00 and set an equal weight rating.