On Wednesday, Capital Power (TSX:CPX) discussed first-quarter financial results during its earnings call. The full transcript is provided below.
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Summary
Capital Power reported a strong Q1 2026 performance with a $404 million adjusted EBITDA, reflecting a $37 million year-over-year increase due to new acquisitions.
Strategic focus remains on diversification, with expansions in natural gas, renewables, and storage across North America, reinforcing a stable portfolio against market volatility.
The company reaffirmed its 2026 guidance, with strong supply and demand fundamentals in key markets and a target of 8-10% annual AFFO per share growth by 2030.
Operational highlights include the extension of the Arlington Valley contract to 2038 and progress on several fully contracted projects in Canada and the US.
Management emphasized a disciplined approach to capital allocation with a focus on risk-adjusted returns, supported by stable cash flows and robust contracting strategies.
Full Transcript
Roy Arthur (Vice President of Investor Relations and Investor Partnerships)
Good day ladies and gentlemen and thank you for standing by. Welcome to The Capital Power first quarter 2026 analyst conference call. At this time all participants are in a listen only mode. After the speaker’s presentation there will be a question and answer session. To ask a question you will need to press Star 11 on your telephone keypad. As a reminder, this conference call is being recorded. At this time I would like to turn the conference over to Mr. Roy Arthur, Vice President of Investor Relations and Investor Partnerships. Sir, please begin. Good morning everyone. My name is Roy Arthur, Vice President Investor Relations and Investment Partnerships. Thank you for joining us to review Capital Power’s first quarter 2026 results which we published earlier today. Our first quarter report and the presentation for this conference call are available on our website. During today’s call, our President and CEO, Avik Day will provide an update on our business. Following that, our Senior Vice President, Finance and CFO Kevin McIntosh will present a review of the quarter end financials for the company. Avik will wrap up with a review of our 2030 strategic priorities, after which we will open the floor to questions from analysts in our interactive Q and A session. Before we start, I would like to remind everyone that certain statements about future events made on the call are forward looking in nature and are based on certain assumptions and analysis made by the company. Actual results could differ materially from the Company’s expectations due to various risks and uncertainties associated with our business. Please refer to the cautionary statement on Forward looking information on Slide 4 or our filings available on SEDAR+. In today’s discussion we we will be referring to various non GAAP financial measures and ratios also noted on slide 4. These measures are not defined financial measures according to GAAP and do not have standardized meanings prescribed by GAAP and therefore are unlikely to be comparable to similar measures used by other enterprises. These measures are provided to complement the GAAP measures in the analysis of the Company’s results. From management’s perspective, reconciliations of these non GAAP financial measures to their nearest GAAP measures can be found in the MDA prepared as of April 28th for the first quarter of 2026. We acknowledge that Capitol Power’s head office in Edmonton is located within the traditional and contemporary home of many Indigenous peoples of Treaty 6 of the Treaty 6 Region and the Metis homeland. We acknowledge the diverse Indigenous communities that are in these areas and whose presence continues to enrich the community and our lives as we learn more about the Indigenous history of the lands on which we live and work. With that I will Hand it over to Avik.
Avik Day (President and CEO)
Thank you, Roy. Our Q1 2026 results reflect the prudence of our strategy and the resilience of our portfolio even against a volatile macro backdrop. Relentless execution is core to who we are. It’s what sets the Capital Power team apart in times of uncertainty driving durable growth. There are three key takeaways we want to leave you with today. First, our business remains stable despite heightened macro and geopolitical uncertainty around the world. Our business and strategy are unchanged here in North America and we continue to see multiple pathways to create value. Second, we are benefiting from diversification across geographies or electricity markets, technologies and markets continue to de risk our portfolio and strengthen the opportunity set we can pursue. As we will touch on later in the presentation, we continue to see strong supply and demand fundamentals in each of the core markets where we operate. Importantly, we also see compelling opportunities for growth across our three core generation technologies, natural gas, renewables and storage. Finally, our approach to risk and return has not changed. We remain disciplined and consistent in how we allocate capital with a clear focus on compelling risk adjusted returns. Our business remains resilient and we continue to offer compelling long term value creation supported by stable cash flows and disciplined growth. We continue to make steady progress on our 2026 priorities and remain disciplined in our approach to value creation. Our success reflects the tireless dedication and strong execution of our team across North America this quarter. We’re also pleased to highlight several important leadership updates that further strengthen our organization. Kevin McIntosh, who joins me on this call, has stepped into the role of Senior Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer. In addition, Andrew Pearson, who has been an integral part of our organization since 2008, has joined the executive team as Senior Vice President US Commercial and is based in our newly opened Washington D.C. office. Looking ahead effective July 1, 2026, Steve Wallen has decided he will retire after 25 years of outstanding service and leadership and Mike Tsushima will join the Executive team as Senior Vice President and Chief Commercial Officer based in our Edmonton headquarters. We are deeply grateful to Steve for his leadership and the lasting impact he has had on capital Power. Together, these transitions underscore the depth of our leadership bench and our continued focus on building and sustaining a high performing team for Q1 2026. Performance highlights include the extension of the Arlington Valley contract through 2038 which reinforces our commercial optimization strategy, securing durable long term contracts with investment grade counterparties, progressing Arlington Valley and Hummel upgrades, advancing construction on four fully contracted projects totaling roughly 280 megawatts across Canada and the US all with investment grade counterparties. Operationally, the team delivered another strong quarter, generating approximately 11.5 terawatt hours across the fleet. Importantly, more than half our generation came from the US portfolio, which continues to underscore the success of our diversification strategy. Finally, our planned outages are progressing on schedule, enhancing reliability and efficiency of our fleet. For the second consecutive year, we saw the market get off to a rocky start owing to macro disruptions. Yet our strategy and our business have stayed consistent. While oil prices and broader market volatility have increased meaningfully, natural gas prices have declined, reinforcing why gas fired generation continues to be structurally advantaged. Natural gas offers low cost fuel operational flexibility and meaningful insulation from global disruption here in North America, which reinforces our conviction that this fuel source is pivotal to to meeting long term power demand growth and preserving affordability. The bottom line is simple, positive industry fundamentals remain intact for power generation and we are staying the course in our pursuit of delivering reliable and affordable power to our customers in pursuit of creating long term shareholder value. Our return profile reflects a combination of contracted cash flow and merchant generation capacity. From 2021 to 2025, our contracted EBITDA grew at a compounded annual rate of approximately 18% due to a combination of acquisitions, development and recontracting of existing assets. The contracting successes in Ontario, Miso and the Desert Southwest illustrate our ability to unlock meaningful value by optimizing our existing asset base. We continue to make tangible progress delivering the 1 billion of the embedded upside we articulated to you at our investor day in December. As a result of the recent contracting agreements at MCV and Arlington Valley, we have already delivered approximately 170 million of contracted EBITDA upside, with more to come. We operate approximately 12 gigawatts across our North American portfolio, with roughly 7 gigawatts targeted for contracting or recontracting. That gives us a long and visible Runway for incremental value creation from assets already in place. As power market fundamentals continue to tighten, that optionality becomes increasingly valuable. Reinforcing that contracting remains one of our most powerful levers for long term value creation. As we pursue further acquisitions, we will prioritize assets where our platform and expertise can unlock incremental value through commercial optimization. While we have enhanced our diversification in recent years, Alberta remains a meaningful part of our business. It’s an attractive market and presents a unique and compelling value proposition for data center investment. We are encouraged by recent regulatory progress, including the Alberta Canada mou eliminating the Canadian Energy Regulator (CER) for Alberta and continued progress on the ESOS Phase 1 and 2 data center interconnection processes. These steps improve investment certainty and support continued data center growth while maintaining affordability, reliability and meaningful economic benefit for Alberta and Canada. We believe Alberta has some structural advantages over other regions looking to attract large data centers. For instance, existing underutilized infrastructure includes generation, transmission and distribution. The nature of the Phase one process puts the focus on generation, but it’s important not to lose sight of the transmission and distribution infrastructure. Based on our analysis, the addition of 1.5 gigawatts of load would result in approximately $6 per month savings for the average residential customer in Alberta with existing transmission and distribution spread across more load. In addition to efficient and reliable generation, Alberta benefits from a deep supply of low cost fuel with forward prices trading below other major North American natural gas sales points. Alberta also has a strong track record of load CO location with approximately 3 gigawatts about 25% of provincial load co located with generation. This all reinforces our enthusiasm for this industry to succeed here and create benefits for constituents beyond Alberta. Diversification continues to benefit our portfolio with growth coming from multiple areas. This geographic and market diversity reduces reliance on any singular regulatory or pricing environment and gives us multiple pathways to create value over time. In PJM market, forward prices continue to exhibit strong long term spark spreads with greater visibility to capacity prices out to 2030. In addition, we are encouraged that the recent reliability backstop procurement proposal supports the most cost effective new capacity, which we believe will include brownfield expansions and upgrades on existing generation. Meanwhile, MISO continues to exhibit strong supply and demand fundamentals from a bilateral pricing perspective. We were able to recontract MCV, the largest gas cogeneration plant in the US out to 2040 at attractive pricing capacity. Pricing in this region also continues to see significant upward pressure owing to growing demand. Q1 2026 provides a great example of the benefits of diversification in action. Although we saw elevated gas prices and price volatility in pjm, we also saw strong contributions in Ontario and miso, underscoring the benefits of our diverse and resilient portfolio. In addition to geographic diversification, we continue to focus on three core power generation technologies being natural gas, renewables and storage. In contrast to the forward outlook, historical power generation growth has been muted over the past 20 years averaging about 0.5% per annum. However, these three technologies have demonstrated significant and consistent growth well in excess of that over the past 20 years. Natural gas fired generation has grown steadily as aging coal units, retirement and rising renewable penetration has increased the need for reliable, dispatchable power. That same push for reliability has also fueled rapid growth in utility scale battery storage, supported by declining lithium costs and longer storage duration to better integrate intermittent renewables when we look forward, we continue to see opportunities across all three of our businesses. Natural gas, renewables and storage each play an important role in meeting the needs of the grid as power demand continues to rise. As we indicated at Investor Day, natural gas will play a starring role. Together, this technological mix positions us well to capture rising demand while maintaining flexibility, allowing us to respond to the needs of our customers across our markets. Now I will hand it over to our Chief financial officer, Kevin McIntosh to provide our financial update.
Kevin McIntosh (Senior Vice President, Finance and Chief Financial Officer)
Thank you Avik and good morning everyone. I’m Kevin McIntosh and I’m pleased to join you today as Capital Power’s new CFO. We have significant opportunities ahead and while our ambition is bold, we are starting from a position of incredible strength with a high quality asset base and strong strategic positioning. Before we walk through the quarter, I’d like to briefly revisit a few of the key themes outlined at Investor Day as they continue to guide how we think about risk, return and capital allocation across the business. Looking at the past decade, our performance demonstrates a consistent ability to to deliver durable growth and strong shareholder returns. First, on returns to shareholders, we have increased our dividend for 12 consecutive years, compounding at roughly 7% annually from $1.51 per share in 2016 to $2.69 per share in 2025. Second, dividend growth has been supported by real business growth. Adjusted EBITDA has grown at approximately 13% compounded annually, increasing from $509 million in 2016 to $1.6 billion in 2025. This growth has been achieved within clear financial guardrails, including maintaining a 30 to 50% targeted dividend payout ratio, approximately 4 times net debt to EBITDA and a largely contracted cash flow base. This is a track record of excellence built through dedication and discipline. I’m excited to be part of this team and build on this legacy, delivering real value for you, our shareholders. Our balance sheet remains a core strength and is the foundation that supports fleet growth, capital deployment and long term value creation. In 2026, approximately 75% of our cash flow is secured through long term contracts or hedges, providing a high level of visibility and durability. That stable cash flow base gives us the flexibility to pursue M&A in merchant markets, grow the dividend and ultimately deliver strong total shareholder returns. The quality of that contracted base is equally important. Roughly 90% of our PPAs are with a rated or higher counterparties reinforcing revenue certainty and credit quality across the portfolio. Our weighted average contract life has consistently remained in the 9 to 11 years range reflecting the strong positioning of our asset base to meet customer needs. We remain confident in our ability to execute commercial optimization including long term contracting throughout our portfolio. Recent examples include the Arlington Valley and MCV contracts, both which extended contract duration on existing assets with investment …
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