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FOLSOM, N.J. -- Charles Biscieglia, chairman, president and CEO of South Jersey Industries (NYSE: SJI) announced today that the company anticipates full year 2002 earnings per share growth of 6 to 7 percent. Earnings per share from continuing operations in 2001 totaled $2.29.
“Investors have seen a number of recent earnings warnings in the market in general and, in particular from natural gas utility companies due to record warm weather this winter. In contrast, my expectation for SJI is that we will follow three consecutive years of record earnings with a strong performance and another record year in 2002,” stated Biscieglia. “Successes we’ve experienced during the first quarter across a number of business lines give me confidence in our ability to deliver this earnings per share growth.” SJI’s expected strong performance comes despite weather in SJI’s gas utility territory that was 16 percent warmer than last year and 19 percent warmer than normal during January and February of 2002. March will also prove to be an unusually warm month.
SJI expects its 2002 performance to benefit from increased earnings contributions from both the utility and non-utility business lines. SJI anticipates that South Jersey Gas, its regulated natural gas utility, will benefit from an expected 3.0% increase in total customers, a significant contribution from its appliance services business, and continued attention to operating efficiency.
SJI’s non-utility operations are expected to provide a greater earnings contribution due to a significantly accelerated pace of retail gas commodity customer acquisitions. Non-utility retail gas commodity customers total 44,000 year-to-date with the addition of almost 14,000 customers since January 1, 2002. Further helping increase earnings is the continued growth of the meter reading and energy services businesses. SJI's wholesale gas marketing operation will also continue to be a significant contributor in 2002.
A combination of extremely warm weather this year, and a spike in wholesale gas profits resulting from unusual market conditions last year will produce lower first quarter earnings than last year. However, first quarter performance is exceeding the company's expectations and Biscieglia remains confident that this provides the basis for SJI producing another record year.
Webcast & Conference Call
SJI will hold an open conference call
and webcast to discuss its 2002 earnings expectations today at 10 a.m. Eastern.
To participate in the call, dial 1-800-360-9865 approximately 10 minutes ahead
of the scheduled time. To listen to the live webcast, simply visit the South
Jersey Industries website at http://www.sjindustries.com
and click the webcast icon. A recorded version of the webcast will be available
at SJI’s website following the call. A rebroadcast will also be available
by phoning 1-800-428-6051 and entering the code: 237021.
South Jersey Industries (NYSE: SJI)
is an energy services holding company for South Jersey Gas, South Jersey Energy,
South Jersey Resources and Marina Energy. To learn more about SJI and its subsidiaries
please visit http://www.sjindustries.com
on the Internet.
This release contains forward-looking
statements about SJI’s financial performance. The statements are made in
good faith and deemed reasonable at the date of this release.
Actual results may vary and SJI encourages you to conduct your own research before making any investment decisions including a review of SJI’s Annual Report to Shareholders and Forms 10K and 10Q for a complete discussion of risks and/or uncertainties that may cause actual results to vary. We assume no duty to update these statements.