Electric Utilities · #67 in the Retail 100

Vistra

VST

Our rating: hold
12-month target: $161.54 +20.0%
Expected vs. S&P 500: +2.2 ptsSee the math
Next earnings: Nov 6TomorrowListen to the call, 10:00 AM ET ↗

Cheap Texas power is pulling Vistra's 2027 profit toward the low end of guidance, even with 94% of its output sold ahead.

Summary

Vistra sells electricity to about 5 million homes and businesses and owns power plants in Texas and the East, including four nuclear plants. Its retail, Texas and Eastern businesses each earn roughly a third of operating profit. Tech companies want its nuclear power for AI data centers, and Vistra has signed long contracts with Amazon and Meta. But cheap Texas power is weighing on profit, and the stock depends on those contracts and new acquisitions making up for it.

$139.58

-$53.46 (-27.69%)Past year

What Vistra does

Vistra runs about 44,000 megawatts of power plants and sells the output two ways: on its own plans to 5 million homes and businesses, and into the grid.^5,6,12,37

What it sells

Retail electricity80% of revenue, 2025
Power plans under TXU Energy and other brands. The full bill counts as revenue, which is why this line looks so large.
Wholesale power20% of revenue, 2025
Power sold into grid markets and on long contracts, including 20-year deals with Amazon and Meta.
Its power plants
62% natural gas, 20% coal, 15% nuclear. The nuclear plants are what the tech companies are signing up for.

Who buys it

About 5 million homes and businesses, 2.6 million of them in Texas, plus the grid markets its plants sell into. No single customer is a large share of sales.

Where you've seen it

If you pay a TXU Energy bill in Texas, you are a Vistra customer.

The backstory

Tech companies building AI data centers want steady, carbon-free power for decades, and nuclear plants supply it around the clock. In March 2024 Vistra bought Energy Harbor, adding three nuclear plants and roughly 1 million retail customers. In September 2025 it signed a 20-year deal for up to 1,200 MW from Texas's Comanche Peak plant, later revealed as Amazon, and in January 2026 a deal with Meta for its Ohio and Pennsylvania plants.

How the business makes money

Why Vistra is locking its nuclear power into 20-year deals^{1,2,6,7,8,9,10,12,19}

Step 1
Vistra's nuclear, gas and coal plants make power, and it earns the gap between running costs and the price it gets.
Step 2
Cheap Texas power has cut that price, so Vistra sells most of next year's output ahead at fixed prices.
Step 3
Its own retail brands like TXU resell that power to 5 million homes and businesses, adding steadier profit: $1.6 billion in 2025.
Step 4
Tech companies want nuclear power for AI data centers, so Amazon and Meta signed 20-year fixed-price deals, mostly starting in late 2026 and 2027.
What shareholders get
Spare cash buys back stock, over $6.5 billion since late 2021, cutting the share count about 30%.

Advantages

Nuclear plants tech companies want

Major advantage

Vistra's biggest advantage. New nuclear takes years to permit and build, so its roughly 6,400 MW of nuclear plants are scarce enough to sell on long contracts.^6,7,12

It owns both customers and plants

Strong advantage

A real cushion. Retail earned $1.6 billion of operating profit in 2025, and owning both customers and plants lets Vistra sell its own output when wholesale prices are low.⁹

A shrinking share count

Supporting

A help to shareholders rather than a business edge. Buybacks have cut the share count about 30% since November 2021.^1,2

What's changing

Contracts signed, income still to come

Vistra has signed the contracts but does not yet earn from them. Meta deliveries start in late 2026 and Amazon's a year later. The Cogentrix purchase, worth $4 billion, had not closed by early October. On October 5 the Energy Department offered a conditional loan of up to $4.2 billion for upgrades at its Ohio and Pennsylvania nuclear plants, and the stock rose.^{1,2,6,9,10,12,20,21,30,31,11}

Competitors

Who else an investor would consider, and how they compare.

Company	Market value	What it does	Compared with Vistra
Vistrathis stock	$46.85B	Vistra runs about 44,000 megawatts of power plants and sells the output two ways: on its own plans to 5 million homes and businesses, and into the grid.
Constellation EnergyCEG	$89.45B	Runs the largest U.S. nuclear fleet, plus gas plants from buying Calpine.	Constellation is bigger in nuclear; Vistra leans more on Texas and selling power to homes.¹⁶
NRG EnergyNRG	$19.68B	Sells electricity to Texas homes and businesses, backed by a growing fleet of gas plants.	Similar Texas retail and gas businesses, but only Vistra owns nuclear plants.¹⁷
Talen EnergyTLN	$15.97B	Owns Pennsylvania's Susquehanna nuclear plant and sells much of its power to Amazon.	Talen is a smaller, Pennsylvania-focused bet; Vistra spans Texas and the East.¹⁸

Leadership

Who runs the company, and how the stock has done under the CEO.

VST +430.8%S&P 500 +83.1%Price change since Aug 2022 · log scale

2023202420252026

Jim BurkePresident and CEO4.2 yrs

Kris MoldovanEVP and CFO4.2 yrs

Stacey DoréChief Strategy and Sustainability Offic…4.1 yrs

When Burke was named (Mar 2022), the stock moved -1.6% that day; the S&P 500 moved 0%.

Wall Street on Burke: PositiveBMO rates it a Buy, saying Vistra's investments position it to win power demand from data centers despite regulatory challenges in Texas. Wells Fargo rates it a Buy but cut its price target to $212 on a cautious 2027 outlook.^L5

Leadership sources (5) · researched Oct 2026

L1Vistra President Jim Burke to Become Company's Chief Executive Officer · Vistra, 2022-03-21
L2Vistra Appoints Kris Moldovan as Chief Financial Officer · Vistra / PR Newswire, 2022-07-21
L3Vistra Names Industry Veteran Stacey Doré as Chief Strategy & Sustainability Officer · Vistra, 2022-08-22
L4Leadership · Vistra, 2026-10-08
L5BMO cuts Vistra Energy stock price target on regulatory challenges · Investing.com, 2026-10-05

Bull vs. bear: two bets on the same stock

1
A share is a small slice of the company. Its value comes from the profits the company will make in the future.
2
Nobody knows those profits yet. Buyers (bulls) pay today's price betting they'll beat what most people expect. Sellers (bears) bet they'll fall short.
3
When results come in, the price moves toward whichever side was right, and that side makes money.

The question they disagree on

Will new data center contracts and acquisitions lift Vistra's 2027 operating profit above $7.4 billion while Texas wholesale power sells for about $30 per megawatt-hour?^{1,2,3,5,6,11,22,29,32}

Bull case: why buyers buy

If the Meta and Amazon contracts start on time and the Cogentrix gas plant purchase closes, contracted income outweighs weak Texas prices and 2027 profit beats guidance.

Hedging limits the damage from cheap power. Vistra had already sold most of its 2027 output at fixed prices, so this year's drop reaches next year only partly.
Meta's deal locks in nuclear income for decades. Its contracts cover 2,609 MW from the Perry and Davis-Besse plants and their upgrades.
New deals could lift profit above the range. The finance chief said Cogentrix and the Meta premium could add roughly $700 million to 2027 operating profit.
The East and retail are holding up. Eastern plants' profit rose about half last quarter during a record summer peak on the eastern grid, and retail held steady.

Bear case: why sellers sell

If Texas power stays near $30 and data center hookups slow, Vistra keeps losing income in its largest region exposed to market prices, and analysts keep cutting estimates.

Texas power is too cheap to support new plants. CEO Jim Burke said this year's wholesale prices don't justify building them.
Next year looks worse. The finance chief said 2027 Texas prices are meaningfully lower, pulling profit toward the bottom of the range.
Analysts are cutting estimates. Their 2027 earnings estimates fell 8% over the past three months.
A Texas grid review could slow data center deals. Texas ordered an audit of about 474 gigawatts of connection requests, though Vistra says its Amazon deal is unaffected.

Where Delphi landsholdWe think today's price already weighs both sides fairly.See why

What to watch

The numbers that will settle the debate.

Texas wholesale power price▼ worsening

About $30 per megawatt-hour so far in 2026; prices for 2027 delivery meaningfully lower^2,3

Sets what Texas plants earn on power not already sold under contract or to retail customers.

Adjusted operating profit▲ improving

$1.77 billion last quarter, up 31%: Texas $311M, East $642M, West $68M^1,4

Shows whether contracts and Eastern plants offset Texas, against 2026 guidance of $6.8 to $7.6 billion.

Retail operating profit▲ improving

$773 million last quarter, up from $756 million a year ago^1,2

The steadier part of the business, and a test of whether customers stay as prices change.

Next earnings report

Nov 6

Tomorrow

Listen to the call, 10:00 AM ET ↗

Expected earnings per share: $2.38
Expected revenue: —

What to listen for: Whether the 2027 outlook holds at $7.4 billion or more once Cogentrix and the Meta premium are added, and whether Cogentrix has closed.^14,29

What would prove this wrong

✕Texas power prices for future delivery fall further and 2027 profit lands below $7.4 billion.
✕Meta or Amazon deliveries slip past 2027.
✕The Cogentrix purchase fails to close or closes on worse terms.
✕A nuclear plant has a long unplanned outage.

Our ratingHoldas of Nov 2 close, $134.61 · what ratings mean

The stock is cheap against its last two years of valuations, but falling Texas power prices keep pulling 2027 estimates down, so expected gains only match the S&P 500.

12-month target: $161.54 (+20.0%)
Plus dividend: +0.7%
S&P 500, same method, with dividends: +18.5%
Expected vs the market: +2.2 points

The math behind the recommendation

Three 12-month price scenarios, weighted by probability, compared with the S&P 500 under the same method.

Now $134.61

Target $161.54

bull case20% likely

$211.97 +57%

Meta deliveries start on time, Cogentrix closes and Texas prices recover, so 2027 profit beats the $7.4 to $7.8 billion range and estimates rise again.

$12.66 earnings per share × 16.7 = $211.97

base case50% likely

$166.26 +24%

Contracts and Eastern plants offset weak Texas prices, 2027 profit lands near the low end of the range, and earnings per share grow about 12% a year.

$11.40 earnings per share × 14.6 = $166.26

bear case30% likely

$120.04 -11%

Texas power stays near $30 and deliveries or the Cogentrix purchase slip, so 2027 profit misses $7.4 billion and analysts keep cutting estimates.

$10.67 earnings per share × 11.3 = $120.04

Why these odds: Analysts cut 2027 estimates 8% in 90 days and management says 2027 is trending low, though Vistra did beat Zacks estimates in three of the last four quarters.

How the prices are built: Wall Street expects earnings per share of $11.40 for the year starting a year from now (analysts range from $9.94 to $13.92). Today the stock trades at 13.2 times next year's earnings per share; its five-year middle is 18.63.^{1,3,14,22,23,24,25,26,27,28,33,34,35,36}

What tests the call: Third-quarter 2026 earnings and an update on 2027 guidance (Nov 6)

Buy means expected to beat the S&P 500 by 10+ points over 12 months; Sell means expected to trail it by 10+. Inputs gathered Oct 5; the recommendation updates with the price every day. Model-generated, not personalized investment advice. How ratings work · Track record

What the price assumes

At $134.61, investors pay less for each dollar of Vistra's earnings than for the average stock's

Vistra trades at 13 times the earnings analysts expect over the next 12 months. That ratio is the multiple: what investors pay today for each dollar of a year's earnings. That is cheaper than it has been 80% of the time over the past five years, when the middle was 19.

Analysts expect earnings to grow about 12% the year after, against about 16% for the S&P 500. The S&P 500 trades at 19 times. At the market's multiple, today's price would only make sense if Vistra earned about 29% less than forecast over the next year.

Vistra multiple: 13×
S&P 500 multiple: 19×
Base case: +24%
Bear case: −11%

The skewOur bear case loses about 46¢ for every $1 our base case makes. That ratio, how much you stand to lose against how much you stand to make, is the skew.

Last earnings

Q2 2026 results, reported Aug 7

Adjusted operating profit rose 31% to $1.77 billion and 2026 guidance held, but revenue missed estimates and Texas forward prices weighed on 2027.^{1,2,3,4,11,28}

Reported Aug 7	Expected	Actual	Difference
Earnings per share	$2.21	$0.91	-58.9%
Revenue	—	—	—

Beat expectations in 2 of the last 6 quarters

Stock reaction: Closed down about 0.6% on August 7

Why the stock moved

Down: revenue missed estimates, and a $472 million paper loss on hedges for future years cut reported profit.
Down: management said 2027 Texas forward prices were meaningfully lower, pushing 2027 toward the bottom of its range.
Support: power plants earned $1.02 billion, up from $609 million, and 2026 should land at or above guidance midpoint.

What it means for the stock: Weakened the near-term case. The business grew, but Texas prices now matter more for 2027 than the new contracts that start later.