WEC Energy Group Q2 2026 EPS rose to $0.91 from $0.76 as Wisconsin rate increases, first data-center load and stronger renewables results outweighed a mild spring; 2026 guidance of $5.51-$5.61 reaffirmed.
Revenue
$2.1B
+2.6% YoY
Net income
$299M
+21.9% YoY
Diluted EPS
$0.91
+19.7% YoY
Operating margin
21.0%
How WEC compares with Utilities peers
Figure
WEC
Peer median
Rank
Revenue growth (YoY)
+2.6%
+4.3%
15th of 26
Operating margin
21.0%
21.0%
13th of 26
EPS growth (YoY)
+19.7%
+19.7%
13th of 25
Rank 1 = fastest revenue growth, highest operating margin, fastest EPS growth. Peers are the other Utilities companies with a 2026 report on this site, each at its latest period we've analyzed; fiscal calendars differ, so periods are not always the same months.
Wisconsin rate increases and the first data-center load lift WEC's earnings 22% in a mild quarter
WEC Energy Group earned $299.2 million, or $0.91 per diluted share, in the second quarter of 2026, up from $245.4 million ($0.76) a year earlier, on revenue that rose only 2.6% to $2.06 billion. Most of the earnings gain came from two places. New Wisconsin rates took effect on January 1, 2026. The company's unregulated wind and solar business (WEC Infrastructure, or WECI) also had a much better quarter. A mild spring cut sales to homes and small businesses, but the first phase of Microsoft's southeastern Wisconsin data center, in service since April, made up almost exactly that shortfall. Management reaffirmed its full-year guidance of $5.51 to $5.61 per share.
At a glance
+$44.2 million from the Wisconsin rate orders. This was the biggest single driver of higher utility margin in the quarter. For a regulated utility, earnings growth mostly comes from regulators letting it charge for new investment, and that is what happened here.
-$20.4 million from weather, +$20.2 million from customer growth. A warm spring and a cool early summer reduced Wisconsin sales. New load from very large customers (data centers) offset nearly all of that, so weather ended up costing almost nothing net.
$2.08 billion of capital spending in the first half, up 36%. This is the build-out behind the company's $37.5 billion 2026–2030 capital plan. Building it is already adding to earnings through construction-period accounting (explained below) before the assets are finished.
The numbers
Metric
Q2 2026
Q2 2025
YoY Change
Operating revenues
$2,062.1M
$2,009.5M
Read 0 community reports on WEC Energy Group, or write your own.Write a report
Revenue is a weak guide to a utility's performance. Fuel, purchased power and natural gas costs are passed through to customers at cost, so revenue moves with commodity prices without changing profit. In Q2, cost of sales actually fell $14.9 million while revenue rose $52.6 million. The earnings improvement came from the rates WEC is allowed to charge on its investments, not from fuel prices.
Where the earnings came from
WEC reports earnings by segment. The quarter's $53.8 million increase in net income broke down as follows:
Segment
Q2 2026
Q2 2025
Change
Wisconsin utilities
$208.2M
$182.4M
+$25.8M
Illinois (Peoples Gas, North Shore Gas)
$19.5M
$22.6M
-$3.1M
Other states (Michigan, Minnesota gas)
$1.2M
$3.5M
-$2.3M
Electric transmission (ATC stake)
$44.2M
$35.6M
+$8.6M
Non-utility energy infrastructure (WECI)
$118.7M
$82.3M
+$36.4M
Corporate and other
-$92.6M
-$81.0M
-$11.6M
Total
$299.2M
$245.4M
+$53.8M
Wisconsin (+14.1%). This segment is the core of the company. Its "utility margin" (revenue minus fuel, purchased power and gas costs) rose $56.4 million. Of that, $44.2 million came from the rate orders the Public Service Commission of Wisconsin (PSCW) approved for 2026, and $10.8 million came from a "current return" on the cost of dedicated power plants being built for very large customers (VLCs). Operating income still slipped $9.4 million. Operating expenses rose $65.8 million: $22.4 million of pass-through regulatory amortizations, which are offset in revenue; $17.9 million of depreciation on new assets; and $16.0 million of transmission cost. What lifted the bottom line was $29.6 million more AFUDC-Equity. AFUDC stands for Allowance for Funds Used During Construction. It lets a utility book a return on money tied up in projects that are still being built, because regulators will later let it recover that return from customers. Lower income tax also helped (tax expense fell $6.7 million, including $5.8 million of AFUDC-related tax benefits).
Weather versus data centers. Heating degree days in the We Energies area were 20.4% below last year, and cooling degree days were 23.9% below, so spring was warmer than usual and early summer was cooler. The filing puts the margin hit from this "unfavorable spring weather" at $20.4 million. It was "substantially offset by a $20.2 million increase in margins related to weather-normalized customer growth, driven by the impact of our VLCs." You can see it in the sales volumes. Wisconsin residential electricity sales fell 1.1% (28.2 GWh). Large commercial and industrial sales jumped 289.5 GWh (+9.6%). Microsoft's first phase came online in April. Excluding VLCs and the Michigan iron ore mine, weather-normalized retail electric deliveries rose 1.2%. That is modest growth, and without the data centers it would be the whole story.
WECI (+44%). The unregulated renewables business had the biggest swing, and much of it will not repeat (see below). Operating income rose $49.4 million on: $9.9 million less storm-damage impairment at the Samson I and Delilah I solar sites; $8.0 million of business-interruption insurance for storms in 2023–24; $8.0 million of lower grid congestion costs; $6.4 million of lower maintenance cost under fixed-price service agreements; $6.3 million of performance payments; and $4.9 million of higher capacity revenue.
Transmission (+24%). WEC owns about 60% of American Transmission Company. Its share of ATC's earnings rose $10.7 million as ATC kept investing.
Illinois and other states. These gas utilities earn most of their profit in winter, so Q2 is always small. Illinois fell $3.1 million, partly because Q2 2025 included a gain on a renegotiated lease. The corporate segment's loss widened $11.6 million, mostly from an interim tax true-up and higher short-term borrowing costs.
What the headline numbers hide
A large share of earnings growth is non-cash construction accounting. AFUDC-Equity was $94.8 million in the first half, against $38.6 million a year earlier. That $56.2 million increase is about 42% of the $134.0 million rise in six-month net income. This is normal for a utility in a heavy building phase, and regulators do allow it. But it is booked profit, not cash, and it turns into cash only once the plants enter customer rates.
Operating cash covers the business but not the build-out. Operating cash flow was $2.21 billion in the first half, 2.0 times net income, so reported profit is well backed by cash. Capital spending of $2.08 billion plus dividends of $620 million exceeded it, however. WEC issued $1.80 billion of long-term debt, retired $1.19 billion, and has signed forward contracts to sell about 6.4 million shares for settlement in 2027. Part of the operating cash flow was a seasonal $479.5 million fall in receivables after the winter heating season, which will reverse.
WECI's jump includes items that won't recur. The $8.0 million insurance recovery and the $6.3 million performance payments together are $14.3 million pre-tax. The $9.9 million "benefit" is a smaller impairment than last year, not a gain. Without these, WECI still improved, but by less than the headline 44%.
EPS grew despite dilution, not because of buybacks. Diluted shares rose 2.1% because of earlier stock issuance. Tax was not a tailwind at the consolidated level either: Q2 income tax expense was $27.0 million on $328.0 million pre-tax (8.2%), against 7.4% a year earlier. The company expects a full-year effective rate of 6.5–7.5%. The growth came from rates, the investment build-out and WECI.
Guidance is unchanged. The $5.51–$5.61 range was reaffirmed, assuming normal weather for the rest of the year. First-half EPS of $3.36 is about 60% of the $5.56 midpoint.
Takeaway: WEC's earnings are starting to reflect the data-center build-out. Very large customers offset a $20 million weather hit in their first quarter of service, and the rising return booked on projects under construction (AFUDC) drove much of the growth. That makes the next year a test of regulatory approvals and collateral as much as of electricity demand: the new VLC tariff is under court challenge, Oracle's cloud unit may need to post about $7 billion of collateral, and rate cases for 2027 in Wisconsin and Illinois are still waiting on decisions.
The investment plan and the regulatory calendar
For a regulated utility, rate base is the value of the plants, wires and pipes that regulators let it earn a return on. It is the main driver of long-term earnings. WEC's 10-Q shows capital spending of $5.02 billion for 2026, $6.95 billion for 2027 and $6.97 billion for 2028. In a September 4, 2026 investor presentation (filed with the SEC), management put the 2026–2030 plan at $37.5 billion, the largest in company history. It projects the asset base growing from $34.2 billion in 2025 to $59.6 billion in 2030 (11.7% a year), with long-term EPS growth of 7–8% a year. The plan includes $12.6 billion of regulated solar, batteries and wind in Wisconsin and $6.1 billion of gas-fired generation, including 3,300 MW of combustion turbines at Oak Creek.
The demand behind it is concentrated. Microsoft has announced more than $20 billion of data-center investment in southeastern Wisconsin, and WEC expects up to 2.6 GW of load growth in the Milwaukee-to-Chicago corridor through 2030. Vantage Data Centers' Port Washington campus is forecast to add 1.3 GW. The PSCW approved WEC's VLC and Bespoke Resources tariffs on May 21, 2026. Customers adding more than 100 MW pay directly for the plants built to serve them, on a return on equity (ROE) of 10.48–10.98% that is fixed for the term of the contract. If they cancel, they still owe for facilities already built. Microsoft signed a service agreement under the tariff after it was approved. Three risks sit around this:
Collateral. The 10-Q says Oracle America Cloud Services, which will take service under the tariffs, must post more collateral after its parent's credit rating was downgraded, with a peak requirement of about $7 billion. WEC says it "fully expect[s]" the collateral to be provided.
Litigation. A VLC has asked a Wisconsin court to review the tariff's credit-support and collateral rules. WEC's own rehearing request on those provisions was deemed denied.
Rate cases. We Energies, WPS and Wisconsin Gas have asked for 2027 increases, including $175.8 million (4.7%) at We Energies electric and $86.1 million (6.3%) at WPS electric, plus further increases for 2028, on a 9.9% ROE. Peoples Gas is seeking $144.0 million (14.6%) on a 10.10% ROE. That request follows a 2025 settlement that permanently removed $130 million from its rate base and requires $75 million of customer refunds over 2026–28. Decisions on both are expected in Q4 2026.
Outlook
Management's 2026 guidance is $5.51–$5.61 per diluted share, reaffirmed with this quarter, and the dividend was raised 6.7% in January to an annual $3.81. Q3 and Q4 are usually driven by summer cooling in Wisconsin and early heating demand in Illinois, so the second half depends mostly on weather.
Our read: the numbers in this filing support management's growth case. Rate-order margin is coming in as approved, and VLC load has started to show up in sales. The main uncertainty is financing and regulation rather than demand. About $7 billion a year of spending, funded partly with new equity ($5.3–5.7 billion planned over 2026–2030 per the September presentation), keeps shareholders exposed to dilution. The large increase in AFUDC also means today's earnings depend on projects finishing on time and entering rates. The Q4 2026 rate orders in Wisconsin and Illinois, and whether Oracle posts its collateral, are the two things to watch before the Q3 report.
Source: WEC Energy Group Form 10-Q for the quarter ended June 30, 2026 (filed August 4, 2026), with guidance from the July 29, 2026 earnings release and capital-plan figures from the September 4, 2026 investor presentation furnished on Form 8-K.