Nuclear Generation & Utilities

The U.S. Department of Energy has approved a roughly US$4.00 billion federal loan package for Vistra to upgrade three nuclear plants serving the PJM grid, as power demand climbs from data centers and other intensive users. The federal backing supports nuclear capacity upgrades and underscores Vistra's role as a reliability provider in a tightening U.S. power system. The loan sharpens the company's investment narrative around long-term contracted power, though Vistra has separately challenged PJM's Interim Resource Adequacy Service at FERC, arguing the measure could chill investment and misprice capacity for large loads. Vistra's narrative projects $26.0 billion in revenue and $4.1 billion in earnings by 2029, requiring 10.7% yearly revenue growth and a $2.1 billion earnings increase from $2.0 billion today, while some analysts assume revenues near US$33.4 billion and earnings around US$4.9 billion by 2029.

Oracle and We Energies announced a nuclear power subscription deal on October 2, 2026, under which Oracle will take 10-20% of the output from the Point Beach Nuclear Plant, or 125-250 megawatts, for the $15 billion Lighthouse Campus AI data center in Port Washington, Wisconsin. The campus, co-developed by Oracle, OpenAI, and Vantage Data Centers as part of the broader Stargate initiative, is designed to house close to 1 gigawatt of AI capacity within a 1.3 gigawatt total electrical footprint, with completion targeted for 2028. Oracle has committed to fully funding the energy costs for its portion, and the deal is the primary driver of a proposed $176 million electric rate hike for We Energies customers in 2027, accounting for roughly 20% of that increase, while the utility projects the arrangement will save customers approximately $300 million in fuel costs between 2027 and 2033. The subscription, a first-of-its-kind model in Wisconsin, requires approval from the Wisconsin Public Service Commission, which is weighing whether to require tech companies to cover 100% of new power plant costs. The deal is part of an industry-wide pivot in which Big Tech has contracted over 10 gigawatts of new nuclear capacity in the United States over the past year, including Microsoft's 20-year power purchase agreement for the 835-megawatt restart of Three Mile Island, Amazon's acquisition of a nuclear-adjacent Pennsylvania campus for over $650 million and its $500 million investment in X-energy small modular reactors, and Google's order of 500 megawatts from Kairos Power. Data center power demand reached 29.6 gigawatts by late 2025, equivalent to the peak demand of New York state, and the International Energy Agency projects it will rise by 130% by 2030, even as U.S. nuclear output stayed largely flat between 2020 and 2025 and no small modular reactors are under construction in the country.

The U.S. government plans to lend Vistra about US$4.2b to expand nuclear power output, a move that spotlights utilities tied to nuclear energy as data centers, EVs, and crypto miners drive demand for reliable electricity. The article highlights three nuclear-exposed U.S. utilities as a sample from a broader screen that surfaced 9 more power companies. Entergy, with roughly US$13.4b in revenue and a market value of about US$48b, sees approximately 7 to 12 GW of hyperscale data center potential and 3 to 5 GW of traditional industrial demand in its territory, alongside signed agreements with AWS and Meta supporting roughly 8.5% to 9% annual retail sales growth. Ameren, a US$27.6b holding company, owns the Callaway nuclear facility and is studying more nuclear capacity, with 2.8 gigawatts of signed electric service agreements, 3.4 gigawatts of construction agreements, and a further 4 gigawatts of projects with completed interconnection studies in its Missouri territory. Deep Fission, with a market value of roughly US$305 million, develops small modular nuclear reactors buried about a mile underground for utilities, data centers, heavy industry, and government clients.

The U.S. government reportedly plans to provide about $4.2 billion in financing to power producer Vistra to increase electricity generation from its nuclear fleet. Energy Secretary Chris Wright is expected to announce the financing on Monday during a visit to one of Vistra's nuclear facilities along Lake Erie in Ohio, according to a report from Reuters News. The financing would support efforts to increase the output, or uprate, of at least three of Vistra's four nuclear power stations. Vistra operates six reactors across four U.S. nuclear plants, with a combined generating capacity of more than 6.5 gigawatts, enough to supply electricity to roughly 3.25 million homes. The planned financing comes as U.S. electricity demand accelerates after decades of relatively modest growth, driven by the expansion of artificial-intelligence data centers, wider electrification and cryptocurrency mining.

Vistra Corp shares trimmed earlier losses Friday afternoon, trading down 0.3% at $139.20 after dropping to a session low of $135.79 on a Bloomberg report that the Trump administration plans to offer the company a roughly $4 billion loan package to upgrade three of its nuclear plants. The report indicated that US Energy Secretary Chris Wright is expected to announce the funding as soon as Monday during a planned visit to the Perry nuclear complex northeast of Cleveland. The package would fund investments at Vistra's two plants in Ohio and another in Pennsylvania, according to people familiar with the matter who were not authorized to speak publicly. Both the Energy Department and Vistra did not immediately respond to requests for comment, according to the report. The loan would support capacity expansions at existing facilities as electricity demand grows rapidly due to power-hungry data centers seeking round-the-clock energy, with Trump having set a goal of quadrupling US nuclear capacity by 2050. Vistra supplies power to the largest US grid operator, PJM Interconnection LLC, which stretches from Illinois to Washington, D.C., and serves roughly 67 million people.

Oracle announced a commitment to subscribe to a portion of the existing Point Beach Nuclear Plant's electricity generation, an action expected to save Wisconsin utility customers approximately $300 million in fuel costs. The company said the move will help shield more than 1 million Wisconsin utility customers from the plant's rising costs, reduce pressure on household electricity bills, and sustain reliable, carbon-free power for the state's grid. Mahesh Thiagarajan, executive vice president of Oracle Cloud Infrastructure, said Oracle is absorbing approximately $300 million in rising energy costs to protect Wisconsin ratepayers. The planned commitment builds on Oracle's broader Wisconsin investment through Project Lighthouse, its data center development in Port Washington, which is expected to generate more than $11 billion for the local economy, create more than 4,000 skilled construction jobs over three years, support 1,000 ongoing operations positions, and include full funding of the project's energy costs. Oracle's planned subscription to a portion of the Point Beach purchase power arrangement remains subject to approval by the Public Service Commission of Wisconsin.

Constellation Energy Corporation announced a 20-year power purchase agreement with Amazon covering 690 megawatts of power, including approximately 190 megawatts of new nuclear capacity at the Calvert Cliffs Clean Energy Center. The agreement is expected to enable more than $3 billion in Maryland infrastructure investments, including improvements across the plant's entire 1,790-megawatt generating capacity, with the capacity expansion expected to be completed between 2030 and 2032. The deal will provide Constellation with revenue certainty to support the relicensing of Calvert Cliffs for another 20 years. In the second quarter of 2026, the company signed approximately 920 megawatts of long-term power purchase agreements with diverse, investment-grade customers, with an average duration of 18.5 years and expected full ramp-up by 2032, and also signed a 176-megawatt agreement with Walmart including 30 megawatts of expanded capacity at the Dresden Clean Energy Center. Constellation invested $2.52 billion in the first six months of 2026 and expects capital expenditures of approximately $5.7 billion in 2026 and $4.7 billion in 2027.

JERA, Japan's major power producer, announced a partnership with Dell Technologies and RHAELM, a UK-based AI infrastructure developer, to develop a Hyperscale AI Data Center project in Chiba Prefecture near Tokyo, valued at approximately 15 billion dollars, with a power capacity of about 400 megawatts. It is positioned as one of the largest single-site AI infrastructure projects in Japan. Meanwhile, Apollo Global Management plans to join as RHAELM's investment and financial partner. A key point of the project is that it will be developed on land adjacent to JERA's Chiba thermal power plant, with JERA providing the site and 400 megawatts of power under a long-term agreement of 15 to 25 years, while RHAELM is responsible for development, construction, management, and financing. Dell will supply rack-scale AI infrastructure. The project is scheduled to come online in phases starting in 2028 and is expected to use the full 400 megawatts of power by 2029. The three companies also aim to create a model that expands to other JERA power plant sites during the 2030s, with the goal of developing total data center capacity at the multi-gigawatt level across Japan.

Samsung Electronics and five affiliated companies will invest a combined $1 billion in Helix Digital Infrastructure, an artificial intelligence infrastructure company established by KKR, as the Samsung group expands from semiconductors into data centers, power systems and connectivity networks. Samsung Electronics will invest $500 million, while the remaining $500 million will come from Samsung C&T, Samsung SDS, Samsung SDI, Samsung Life Insurance and Samsung Fire & Marine Insurance, which are investing together. Helix launched in June with plans to develop infrastructure across the entire AI chain, from large-scale data centers and power generation to power transmission and distribution and fiber-optic networks, and is led by Adam Selipsky, former CEO of Amazon Web Services. The company says power availability is one of the key bottlenecks in AI infrastructure, and it plans to secure electricity through direct investment and partnerships with power project developers, including Vistra, a US energy company. KKR, the Kuwait Investment Authority, Nvidia and Vistra are also founding investors in Helix. The investment also opens the way for Samsung's various businesses to combine their expertise: Samsung Electronics supplies semiconductor solutions, while the Device eXperience business provides cooling equipment for data centers through FläktGroup, which Samsung acquired in 2025. Samsung C&T takes on data center and energy projects as an engineering, procurement and construction contractor, Samsung SDS designs and operates data centers and has entered the GPU-as-a-service market, and Samsung SDI provides uninterruptible power supply systems and backup battery systems for data centers, with plans to explore further business opportunities in the sector.

Meta Platforms is planning a C$13 billion data center in Alberta, its first in Canada, a 1-gigawatt facility that could eventually scale to 1.8 gigawatts to support its growing AI operations. Capital Power will initially supply 250 megawatts, while Meta has a long-term agreement with Pembina Pipeline's planned natural gas-fired Greenlight Electricity Centre, expected to enter service in late 2030. Capital Power CEO Avik Dey told Reuters that several other prospective data-center developers are discussing electricity supply with the company, and he expects more U.S. hyperscalers to eventually build large facilities in Alberta, where more than 100 data-center projects have been proposed. Meta's second-quarter revenue rose 28% year over year to $60.8 billion, while advertising revenue grew 27%, but capital expenditures reached $31.08 billion in the quarter alone and the company now expects $130 billion to $145 billion of capex for 2026, leaving free cash flow at just $784 million versus $8.55 billion a year earlier. A Pembina Institute report cited by Reuters warned that letting data centers use Alberta's grid before their own generating capacity is operating could strain supply and raise consumer costs, and a July Angus Reid poll found 68% of Canadians would oppose a large data center near their home.

Guggenheim initiated coverage of Curtiss-Wright Corporation with a Buy rating and a $786 price target, representing 41% upside potential at the time of its September 15 update, citing rising global defense spending and elevated power generation demand as a compelling one-two punch. The call rests on businesses Curtiss-Wright already operates: Aerospace & Defense market sales rose 6% year over year in the second quarter on higher naval defense revenue and stronger electromechanical actuation sales, while commercial market sales rose 5%, with Power & Process growth driven mainly by commercial nuclear solutions. Total company orders increased 8% to $1.1 billion in the quarter, with record demand for defense electronics, and backlog ended at $4.5 billion, 10% higher than at the end of 2025. In July the company announced an $80 million multi-year expansion of its Cheswick, Pennsylvania operations serving naval defense and commercial nuclear customers. For the quarter, sales rose 5% to $924 million, adjusted diluted EPS increased 15% to $3.72, and adjusted operating margin improved 110 basis points to 19.4%, prompting management to raise its full-year outlook to 2026 adjusted sales growth of 8% to 9% and adjusted diluted EPS of $15.10 to $15.40, growth of 14% to 16%.

TotalEnergies confirmed its growth objectives through 2030 and set new ambitions for 2035 at its strategy and outlook presentation in New York, led by Chairman and CEO Patrick Pouyanné. The company reaffirmed energy production growth of 4% per year through 2030 across oil, gas and electricity, with oil and gas production growing more than 3% per year on average between 2025 and 2030 and electricity generation growing more than 20% per year to reach 100-120 TWh per year by 2030, about 20% of the energy mix. TotalEnergies expects free cash flow to rise by around $10 billion from 2025 to 2030 at the same price deck, equivalent to more than $4 per share, and plans net investments of between $14 billion and $17 billion per year over 2027-2032. The Board of Directors adopted a dividend policy on 27th September 2026 to increase the dividend by more than 5% per year for financial years 2026 to 2030, and confirmed a shareholder return of at least 40% of cash flow while deleveraging, with a gearing ratio expected below 10% by the end of 2026. The Board authorized share buybacks of $2.5 billion for the fourth quarter of 2026 and between $2 and $2.5 billion for the first quarter of 2027.

Costco Wholesale Corp. reported fourth-quarter fiscal 2026 adjusted earnings of $6.60 per share, beating the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $6.48 per share, sending its shares up 2.9%. Shares of People Inc. jumped 11.3% following a Wall Street Journal report that MGM Resorts International is considering acquiring the company. Akamai Technologies Inc. gained 3.2% after entering a seven-year power deal with AI giant Anthropic worth $11.6 billion. Scholastic Corp. tumbled 7.1% after posting a first-quarter fiscal 2027 adjusted loss of $3.63 per share, wider than the Zacks Consensus Estimate of a loss of $3.42 per share.

Microsoft plans to expand its global data center capacity to more than 38 gigawatts by 2032, more than tripling its current roughly 12-gigawatt footprint, according to Bloomberg News reporting cited by Reuters and attributed to people familiar with the plans. Only about 2 gigawatts of Microsoft's current capacity is dedicated to AI-specific chips, a share the company expects to grow to roughly one-third of the much larger 38-gigawatt total by 2032, though Microsoft has not confirmed the target in any public filing or statement. The reported roadmap rests on strong cloud demand: Azure and other cloud services revenue rose 43% year over year in fiscal Q4, Microsoft Cloud revenue reached $59.3 billion for the quarter and $214.4 billion for fiscal 2026, and commercial remaining performance obligations climbed 84% year over year to $678 billion, with roughly 30% expected to be recognized as revenue over the next 12 months. Funding the buildout will be costly, with Microsoft expecting more than $50 billion of capital expenditures in fiscal Q1 2027 and about $175 billion during calendar 2026 under its broader capex definition, after roughly $145 billion in fiscal 2026. Power and political hurdles could slow the plan, as Texas temporarily halted approvals for new data center grid connections and New York imposed a moratorium on large new data centers, even as Microsoft signed a 20-year agreement with Constellation Energy tied to the restart of the 835-megawatt Three Mile Island Unit 1.

Jia Dian Electric announced on the evening of September 28 that its controlling subsidiary won the bid for the 620 million yuan AU project LOT120F reactor coolant pump equipment. Several other important announcements were made that evening: Yuanlin Co. plans to acquire 93.5% of Hualan Micro's shares, and the company's stock will resume trading on September 29; a subsidiary of Bohai Leasing's controlling subsidiary sold 33 aircraft leasing assets with a market price of approximately 1.609 billion US dollars; Hunan Yuneng shareholder CATL's reduction plan period expired, with a total reduction of approximately 2.06% of shares; Wonders Information jointly won the bid for the 143 million yuan mine water upgrading treatment phase two project; China Rare Nonferrous Metals increased capital to its wholly-owned subsidiary by 306 million yuan. In addition, Dingyang Technology released the new SNA6000A series high-performance vector network analyzer, and Xuelong Group reminded that the recent stock price increase is relatively large and there may be a risk of rapid decline.

Jiamusi Electric announced that its controlling subsidiary, Harbin Electric Power Equipment Company, recently received a bid award notice from China Nuclear Power Engineering Company, confirming it as the winning bidder for the AU project LOT120F reactor coolant pump equipment, with a bid amount of 620 million yuan.

A securities research note recommends "buying" GULF shares, expecting second-half 2026 results to continue growing and maintaining its 2026 revenue and EBITDA guidance of roughly 12-15% growth, driven by about 700 MW of new capacity in the second half. This includes 623 MW of renewable power plants expected to add about 600 million baht in annual profit, and the 10 MW Chiang Mai community waste-to-energy plant expected to generate about 120 million baht in annual profit. Meanwhile, the LNG import and optimization business is expected to generate about 1.5 billion baht in profit this year. Rising electricity demand from data centers and EV adoption is likely to support dispatch at IPP/SPP power plants. The Jackson power plant in the United States is already benefiting from capacity payments that rose from 270 to 329 dollars per MW-day on demand from data centers in the PJM market. GSA01, with 25 MW, has had customers using its full capacity since June, allowing it to recognize full profit in the second half of 2026, while the first roughly 200 MW of committed data center capacity is expected to be fully operational in 2027 before expanding to about 1,000 MW in late 2028. The company continues to expand its digital infrastructure into a full ecosystem covering energy, data centers, cloud, AI platform and applications, and enterprise solutions, with plans for about 130 to 140 billion baht in equity investment over five years and an allocation of roughly 10% to GULF Edge, which could rise to 15% as data centers grow. It also sees small modular reactors as another long-term investment opportunity if the government provides clarity on laws and regulatory criteria. On sentiment, the view is that the price decline from Singtel's share overhang is nearing resolution after Singtel sold 416 million GULF shares, or 2.8% of the total, in June 2026, cutting its stake from 7.73% to 4.95%, with a lock-up barring further sales of the remaining shares for 90 days, a period that ended on September 23. On technical factors, the price decline formed a low and held the psychological support level of 60.00 with a bullish candlestick signal. The trend is a double bottom pattern, or the completion of an inverted V-shape, with resistance at the 61.25 SMA. If it breaks and holds above that with rising volume, it would be a buy signal for a trading round. For those holding the stock, the recommendation is to hold or add, with a chance to test resistance at 61.25 and 62.75, and for those without the stock, a short-term buy is recommended, focusing on holding support at 60.00 and 59.00, and it should not fall below that.

J.P. Morgan analysts said Europe's accelerating data centre buildout could strengthen the case for new nuclear capacity as technology companies seek dependable, low-carbon electricity to power AI infrastructure. European data centre electricity consumption could rise from about 70 TWh currently to roughly 115 TWh by 2030, according to European Commission estimates cited in the report, and J.P. Morgan forecasts an additional 89 TWh of annual European data centre power demand by 2030 compared with 2023, with Iberia and the Nordics accounting for about 45% of the increase. Europe's announced data centre pipeline stood at 66.1 GW at the end of 2025, compared with 10.8 GW of live capacity. Google recently agreed to a 22-year power purchase agreement with Fortum covering nuclear generation in Finland, carrying an estimated premium of roughly 60% to forward electricity prices, following similar nuclear agreements by Microsoft, Meta, Amazon and Google in the United States. Small modular reactors could play a larger role as demand grows, though Europe currently has no operating commercial SMRs, with the first projects targeted for the early 2030s, and the European Commission estimates €241 billion of investment will be required through 2050 for new large reactors and lifetime extensions.

Mr. Wikit Thirawannarat, IAA, Assistant Managing Director and Head of Investment Strategy at Bualuang Securities, unveiled a portfolio-adjustment strategy for the final stretch of the year in the fourth quarter of 2026, recommending investors rotate among sectors in step with the market. Stocks with their main revenue from overseas remain the key driver, because domestic purchasing power alone is not enough to move the market. The groups that outperformed the market in the third quarter of 2026 were those tied to the global economy and commodities, including petrochemicals, refineries, shipping stocks such as RCL and PRM, agricultural and food-export names such as TVO, TU and ITC, and electronic components such as KCE and HANA. Meanwhile, groups tied to domestic consumption, such as telecoms ADVANC and TRUE and retailers CPALL and CPAXT, rose more slowly than the market. Three investment themes lead the way. First, refineries and petrochemicals, where supply is tight and global demand is strong, with TOP trading at a price-to-book ratio of only about 0.7 times and paying consistent dividends. Second, power plants, expected to be the star performer in the fourth quarter, driven by the build-out of data centers and production bases by foreign companies, clarity on direct PPA contracts, and the power development plan. Third, energy and technology infrastructure, which benefits from transmission systems, substations, smart grids, smart meters, rooftop solar and submarine cable projects. As for industrial estates, after a big run-up in the first and second quarters of 2026, they are expected to enter a period of consolidation and rebound within a sideways range. On external factors, the surge in bond yields worldwide is a highlight to watch; if yields start to fall, that would be a key turning point for the stock market. The Bank of Japan may keep raising rates through the middle of next year, ending at around 1.75 to 2.0 percent, South Korea at 3.5 percent, Europe at 3.0 percent in the first quarter of next year, and the US Federal Reserve may hike another one to two times. As for new US tariffs, the assessment is that they will target specific rival countries rather than be imposed across the board, so Thailand is likely to escape them and may even benefit from cheaper imported raw materials such as soybeans and soybean meal, which would lower animal-feed costs and support meat-export groups such as chicken and pork. On investment strategy, short-term traders are advised to rotate through sector rotation, alternating between banks and commodities, while long-term investors are advised to focus on infrastructure and power plants, with standout large-cap stocks capable of winning projects and co-investing in infrastructure being GULF and PTT.

Chugoku Electric Power has decided to raise ¥149b through a transition loan to fund carbon neutrality projects at its Shimane nuclear and Akatsuka hydroelectric facilities. The funding commitment comes as the utility's shares have returned 0.82% over one day, 6.46% over 30 days, and 18.79% over 90 days, with a one year total shareholder return of 23.46%. Chugoku Electric Power trades at a P/E of 9.9x, above its immediate peer average of 7.3x but below the Asian Electric Utilities industry average of 14.3x and the estimated fair P/E of 12.4x. On Simply Wall St's discounted cash flow model, the stock at ¥1,050.5 screens as expensive versus an estimated future cash flow value of ¥856.76. The utility faces risks if nuclear restarts are delayed or if recent share price gains unwind.

Micron is building one of the largest semiconductor factories in US history outside Syracuse, New York, a project local leaders hope will anchor a broader semiconductor industry in the region. The once-in-a-generation investment is expected to bring 9,000 direct jobs and 40,000 indirect jobs over the next 15 to 20 years, along with more than 100 billion dollars in capital investment, according to Rob Simpson of CenterState CEO. Construction is underway at the White Pine business park, chosen for its real estate, hydropower from Buffalo and nuclear power from Oswego, and a workforce pipeline of 17 colleges and universities within two hours that graduate 7,250 engineers a year. Local business owner Darin Price, whose Right Price companies hopes to win Micron contracts, said the investment could let Syracuse's children stay for good careers rather than leave for work as earlier generations did when employers like Carrier, General Motors and GE departed. Brookings economist Joseph Parilla said Syracuse could become a model for reindustrialization, as the US competes for what McKinsey estimates is a 50 trillion dollar opportunity in strategic industries over the next two decades, though Simpson warned the region must avoid becoming a company town by starting more businesses each year than it loses.