Monday, March 14, 2005 | 10:46 a.m.
Cooler weather, customer growth and a series of rate increases helped push Las Vegas-based Southwest Gas Corp. to a fourth-quarter net income of $40.4 million, or $1.11 a share.
The results were up from net income of $34.5 million, or $1 a share, for the same 2003 quarter.
For the full year 2004, Southwest Gas reported net income of $56.8 million, or $1.60 a share, up from $38.5 million, or $1.13 a share, for 2003.
Operating revenue for the fourth quarter jumped to $460 million, up from $352 million for the year-ago quarter. The company said operating margin -- defined as operating revenue minus the cost of gas sold -- increased by $22 million.
Contributing to that increase was $6 million attributed to customer growth, $7 million from rate relief and another $9 million from cooler weather.
Customer growth, however, also contributed an additional $7.4 million related to the cost of new connections. The company also saw net financing costs increase $2.8 million "principally due to an increase in outstanding debt," the company said in a statement.
Southwest Gas has more than 1.6 million customers in Nevada, Arizona and California.
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