April 22 (Reuters) – Kinder Morgan beat Wall Street expectations for first-quarter profit on Wednesday, helped by higher volumes of natural gas transported through its pipelines.
U.S. pipeline companies are gaining from booming oil and gas output in the Permian Basin and rising natural gas demand due to record LNG exports and surging electricity use from AI operations, cryptocurrency mining and data centers.
The company said it transported about 49,475 billion British thermal units of natural gas per day in the quarter, compared with 45,978 billion Btu per day a year ago.
U.S. natural gas futures averaged $9.54 per million British thermal units (btu) in the January-March quarter, up 9.5% from last year. Natgas prices were supported by a surge in spot prices during Winter Storm Fern early in the quarter.
The Houston, Texas-based firm posted an adjusted profit of 48 cents per share for the three months ended March 31, compared with analysts’ estimate of 40 cents per share, according to data compiled by LSEG.
(Reporting by Varun Sahay in Bengaluru; Editing by Vijay Kishore)
