Atmos Energy Corporation

Thank you for standing by. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the Atmos Energy Corporation fiscal 2026 first quarter earnings conference call. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speaker's remarks, there will be a question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question during this time, simply press star followed by the number one on your telephone keypad. If you would like to withdraw your question, press star one again. Thank you. I would now like to turn the call over to Dan Mazur, Vice President of Investor Relations and Treasurer. You may begin.

Thank you, Jeannie. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us. With me today are Kevin Akers, President and Chief Executive Officer, and Chris Forsythe, Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. Our earnings release and conference call slide presentation, which we will reference in our prepared remarks, are available at atmosenergy.com. under the Investor Relations tab. As we review our financial results and discuss further expectations, please keep in mind that some of our discussion might contain forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Securities Act and the Securities Exchange Act. Our forward-looking statements and projections could differ materially from actual results. The factors that could cause such material differences are outlined on slide 29 and are more fully described in our SEC filing. I will now turn the call over to Kevin.

Thank you, Dan. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. I want to begin today's call by thanking every one of our Atmos Energy employees for their preparation, focus, and dedication to safely providing natural gas service to our customers and communities during the very challenging weather conditions of winter storm burn. And for their dedication throughout the year to execute upon our system modernization strategy as we continue our journey toward our vision to be the safest provider of natural gas services. During Winter Storm Fern, all segments of our business, distribution, transmission, Atmos Pipeline Texas, our underground storage systems, gas supply plans, and our customer support operations all performed very well and to design expectations. I am very proud of our team and their efforts. I'd also like to thank the first responders, emergency responders, and emergency management services teams across our service territory for what they do every day for our community. Yesterday, we reported fiscal 2026 first quarter net income of $403 million or $2.44 per diluted share. Our first quarter capital expenditures totaled $1 billion, but over 85% of these investments focused on enhancing the safety and reliability of our distribution, transmission, and underground storage systems. As a reminder, we re-based our fiscal 2026 guidance to reflect the passage of Texas House Bill 4384. As we stated on our November earnings call and in our investor material, our re-based fiscal 2026 earnings per share guidance is in the range of $8.15 to $8.35 per share. Additionally, we rebased the fiscal 2026 annual dividend to $4 per share, and we plan to grow our dividend in line with our earnings per share growth of 6% to 8% annually. Moving to our Atmos pipeline Texas division, we achieved several project milestones during the first quarter. We completed the installation of approximately 55 miles of 36-inch pipeline from APT's Bethel storage facility to our gross bed compressor station. This provides additional pipeline capacity to transport gas from our Bethel storage into the growing DFW Metroplex and the Interstate 35 corridor between Waco and Austin. We continue to work on phase two of APT's Line WA Loop project as we have placed 13 miles of this project into service. As a reminder, this project is designed to install approximately 44 miles of 36-inch pipeline to the west of Fort Worth to support growth in this area of the DFW Metroplex. The remaining 31 miles is expected to be placed in service this spring. In addition to the enhanced supply capacity of those projects, We completed a project that more than doubles the takeaway capacity at our Bethel salt dome storage facility, providing additional peak day deliverability into the APT system for our LDC customers. Finally, we enhanced APT supply optionality, reliability, and system versatility with the completion of two interconnect projects, adding 700,000 MCF per day of additional natural gas supply to the APT system. Across our service territories, we continue to see steady customer growth. For the 12-month ending December 31, 2025, we added nearly 54,000 new customers with approximately 42,000 of those new customers located here in Texas. And during the first quarter, we added over 1,100 commercial customers and three new industrial customers. This continued demand from all customer classes demonstrates the value and vital role natural gas plays, and economic development across our service territory. The Texas Workforce Commission reported that at the end of December that the seasonally adjusted number of employees was 14.3 million. Texas once again added jobs at a faster rate than the nation over the last 12 months ending December 2025. Our customer support associates and service technicians continue to provide exceptional customer service, achieving customer satisfaction ratings of 98% for the quarter. And our customer advocacy team and customer support agents continued their outreach efforts to energy assistance agencies and customers during the first quarter. Through those efforts, the team helped over 11,000 customers receive nearly $3 million in funding assistance. Recently, our team's customer service efforts were recognized by J.D. Power and Escalant. In December, the J.D. Power 2025 Gas Utility Residential Customer Satisfaction Study ranked Atlas Energy number one in customer satisfaction in the South and Midwest among large utilities. This is Atlas Energy's fourth consecutive year to receive this honor for the Midwest region. And in January, Atlas Energy was named an Escalant 2025 Utility Customer Champion in both the South and Midwest regions. More than 96% of our customers are located in these two regions, and we are very proud of our entire team for their ongoing focus and dedication to providing exceptional customer service. Congratulations and thank you all. I'll now turn the call over to Chris for his update.