Topic: Energy Stocks

Acquisition will help this stock renew high-yielding dividend

This Canadian energy stock has largely built from within, expanding its own operations and securing firm long-term power-purchase contracts.

Yet the company recently completed the acquisition of a major Canadian power company. The new addition provides greater geographical diversity, a new source of energy and a substantial increase in cash flow to help sustain the high-yielding dividend.


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INNERGEX RENEWABLE ENERGY INC. (Toronto symbol INE; www.innergex.com) operates 31 hydroelectric plants, 21 wind farms and one solar power field. The company gets 52% of its power from hydro, 45% from wind and 3% from solar. It has a total generating capacity of 1,093 megawatts.

Innergex began operating in 1990, but waited until 2003 to sell shares to the public (as Innergex Power Income Fund). In 2010, the fund converted to a regular corporation.

The company has steadily expanded its operations in the past few years. To cut its risk, Innergex makes sure it has firm long-term power-purchase contracts in place before it starts to build, or buy, new plants.

Thanks to those new operations, the company’s revenue jumped 65.7%, from $176.7 million in 2012 to $292.8 million in 2016.

Innergex uses hedging contracts to lock-in interest rates on its debt. However, gains and losses on those contracts tend to distort its earnings. As a result, the company lost $0.03 a share (or a total of $5.4 million) in 2012, but earned $0.43 a share (or $48.2 million) in 2013. It then lost $0.63 a share (or $54.9 million) in 2014, and $0.37 a share (or $48.4 million) in 2015. Earnings recovered to $0.28 a share (or $32.0 million) in 2016. .

Due to those distortions, most investors prefer to focus on Innergex’s cash flow, which improved from $0.70 a share in 2012 to $1.00 in 2014. Cash flow per share dipped to $0.99 in 2015, but rose 12.1% to $1.11 in 2016.

In the quarter ended September 30, 2017, cash flow jumped 52.1% to $51.3 million, or $0.47 a share, from $33.7 million, or $0.31, a year earlier. The contribution of new plants more than offset lower wind speeds, which cut the amount of power generated.

Energy stocks: Stock trading at low level to projected 2018 cash flow

In October 2017, Innergex agreed to buy Alterra Power Corp. (Toronto symbol AXY) for $1.1 billion (25% in cash, 75% in stock). It completed the purchase earlier in February.

Alterra operates eight projects (three hydro, two wind, two geothermal and one solar) in Canada, the U.S. and Iceland. It also plans three more projects (one each for wind, hydro and solar); it has another three in advanced stages (two wind and one geothermal).

Alterra shareholders will own 19% of the combined firm. The new operations will help Innergex diversify geographically, both in the U.S. and Iceland. It also adds a new energy source: Icelandic geothermal plants.

The company is borrowing most of the cash needed to buy Alterra. That will push up its long-term debt of $3.3 billion (as of September 30, 2017), which is already a high 2.1 times its market cap. However, steady revenue streams from Alterra’s facilities will help it pay down that debt.

In July 2017, Innergex completed a deal in which it paid $24.2 million for 69.55% of two wind power plants in France. The new facilities have 43 megawatts of generating power and should contribute $14.5 million to the company’s annual revenue.

With the April 2017 payment, Innergex raised its quarterly dividend by 3.1%, to $0.165 a share from $0.16. The new annual rate of $0.66 yields a high 4.4%.

The acquisition of Alterra should increase Innergex’s projected cash flow, from $1.42 a share in 2017 to $1.81 in 2018. The stock trades at just 7.2 times that 2018 forecast.

Recommendation in Canadian Wealth Advisor: Innergex is a buy.

For our specific advice on making the right decisions on energy stocks today, read Energy Sector Stocks: Tips that every successful investor should know about.

For our recent report on a U.S. energy stock that we rate as a buy, read Productive spending helps this energy stock rise with oil prices.

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