Atmos Energy Corp (ATO) Q1 2020 Earnings Call Transcript

Atmos Energy Corp (ATO) Q1 2020 Earnings Call Transcript

Atmos Energy Corp ( NYSE:ATO ) Q1 2020 Earnings Call Feb 5, 2020 , 9:00 a.m. ET. Greetings, and welcome to the Atmos Energy First Quarter 2020 Earnings Conference Call.. It's now my pleasure to introduce your host, Jennifer Hills, Vice President, Investor Relations for Atmos Energy.. Our first speaker is Chris Forsythe, Senior Vice President and CFO of Atmos Energy.. We reported growth in both our distribution and pipeline and storage businesses, driven by continued customer growth in distribution and rate recovery in both segments.. Operating income for our distribution business rose 6.4% to $180 million.. Customers' growth contributed an incremental $4 million as we have continued to benefit from the strong population growth in some of our service areas, most notably in the DFW Metroplex.. We remain on track to invest between $1.85 billion and $1.95 billion this fiscal year.. Slide 19 outlines are planned activities for the remainder of the fiscal year.. We were able to reduce our weighted average cost of debt to 4.32%.. As of December 31, we had about $240 million remaining under equity forward arrangements that must be utilized by the end of our fiscal year.. The strength of our balance sheet and