Why millions of Americans pay for unfinished electricity projects

 

• Summary
• Companies

• Policies shift project financing risk to ratepayers, raising bills before projects are completed
• Consumer advocates and businesses warn advanced funding may not deliver promised savings
• Georgia's Vogtle nuclear project highlights risks of cost overruns and public backlash

BOSTON, May 9 (Reuters) - Millions of Americans are unknowingly financing electric grid projects before they get any benefit.

Policy-makers, in an urgent bid to overhaul the nation’s aging electric grid, are increasingly letting utilities charge customers for power plants and transmission lines long before they’ve been built, boosting near-term bills in exchange for promised savings decades down the road, according to a Reuters review of regulatory disclosures.

At least 40 U.S. states now have some form of CWIP incentive, according to a Reuters review of several thousand pages of electric utility rate disclosures. That’s twice as many as a decade ago, when a survey by economic consultant The Brattle Group found fewer than 20 states with CWIP provisions.

Details on how widely CWIP policies have spread in the past five years ​alongside the boom in data center construction have not been previously reported. Reuters also interviewed two dozen industry officials, analysts, and consumer watchdogs to reflect the impact of these policies on the buildout and repair of the grid and on the electricity bills of American households and businesses.

Reuters ​found that CWIP policies have been used to finance a range of large energy and infrastructure projects, including the Vogtle nuclear reactors in Georgia, which experienced significant cost overruns and delays; a Nevada transmission project that is increasing bills now ⁠for financial benefits expected decades in the future; and a Virginia offshore wind farm that has already collected about $2 billion in ratepayer charges before beginning operations.

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Aramco Q1 profit jumps 25% as Hormuz risks push pipeline to full capacity

 

3D-printed oil pump jacks and the Saudi Aramco logo appear in this illustration taken March 2, 2026. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration Purchase Licensing Rights, opens new tab

• Summary
• Companies

• Aramco profit surges 25% as higher sales boost earnings
• East-West pipeline hits capacity, cushioning Hormuz shipping disruption risks
• Dividends rise while cash flow softens amid geopolitical strain

DUBAI, May 10 (Reuters) - Saudi Aramco reported a 25% jump in first-quarter profit on Sunday, showing its ‌resilience as U.S.-Iran war tensions curtail Strait of Hormuz shipping, with the state oil giant's East-West crude pipeline running at full capacity to mitigate the impact to supplies.

The world's top oil exporter (2222.SE), opens new tab earned a net profit of $32.5 billion in the three months ended March 31, ​beating an LSEG consensus estimate of $30.95 billion.

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Innovation built for fixed income markets with ICE

 

Intercontinental Exchange (ICE) provides end-to-end technological and data-driven innovations for the fixed income markets. By aggregating unstructured data to generate analytics and offering multiple electronic execution protocols, ICE helps market participants enhance transparency, automate workflows, and navigate complex debt environments. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]

ICE's Core Fixed Income Solutions

1. Execution & Trading

ICE revolutionizes how institutional players negotiate and clear bonds with a diverse suite of trading protocols. [1]

• Diverse Protocols: Access deep liquidity pools through click-to-trade, request-for-quote (RFQ), sweeps, and portfolio auctions.
• ICE Bonds: Offers access to corporate, municipal, treasury, and agency bonds via electronic marketplaces BondWave’s fixed income engine integrates with ICE Bonds.
• Price Improvement Volume Clearing (PIVC): ICE Bonds continuously introduces unique clearing innovations, allowing investors to optimize execution quality across credit assets ICE Launches Price Improvement Volume Clearing for Credit. [1, 2, 3, 4]

2. Data & Trading Analytics

To support the fast-evolving market structure, ICE transforms massive amounts of unstructured data into actionable insights: [1]

• Evaluated Pricing: Provides high-quality continuous evaluated pricing, size-adjusted pricing calculations, and reference data to serve as a consistent benchmark.
• Liquidity & TCA: Delivers transaction cost analysis (TCA), liquidity metrics, market depth, and execution quality metrics Fixed Income Trading Analytics - ICE.
• Climate & ESG Risk: Integrates data to help assess the physical and transition risks across bond portfolios Fixed income in 2025: five things we're watching - ICE. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]

3. Indices & Benchmarks

ICE manages one of the most widely referenced fixed income index families in the global financial sector:

• Global Benchmark Coverage: ICE fixed income indices provide comprehensive coverage of corporate, municipal, preferred, and U.S. treasury bonds ICE Fixed Income Indices.
• Climate Indices: Collaborations with major index providers (such as STOXX) allow ICE to supply the data, pricing, and calculation mechanisms for sustainable, climate-aligned benchmarks STOXX & ICE Collaborate on Fixed Income Climate Indices. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]

4. Ecosystem Integration

• ICE ETF Hub: Streamlines and standardizes the creation and redemption process for fixed income exchange-traded funds (ETFs) ICE Announces Milestones Across Its Data Business In 2025 ....
• ICE Global Network (IGN): Delivers ultra-secure, low-latency data feeds and direct connectivity to global liquidity venues. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]

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Fixed Income Perspectives

 

Our latest bond markets insights to help shape portfolios.

Fixed Income Perspectives outlines the current macro and market views from across Capital Group’s extensive fixed income team and offers insights on investors' bond exposure against an ever-changing backdrop.

In our Q2 2026 update, we discuss:

• We believe global growth should remain positive in 2026, but developments in the Middle East suggest a more prolonged and uneven path to resolution and raise the probability of stagflationary outcomes.
• The Federal Reserve (Fed) is likely to remain dovish relative to other central banks that have shifted to a more hawkish stance on concerns about high energy prices impacting inflation.
• In our view, valuations don’t appear to reflect the potential degree of risk and uncertainty in the market. We’re focused on maintaining a conservative, diversified, higher-quality posture in our portfolios.

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Why bond investors can’t ignore the AI revolution

 

AI’s influence on fixed income markets is only just beginning and its eventual effects will become more apparent as time progresses. Even at this point, however, certain things are clear.

 

The Sovereign bond investor – AI has the potential to have a marked effect on the shape of sovereign yield curves. A long-term productivity boost from AI could help advanced economies address debt sustainability as well as achieve higher growth with lower inflation. In turn, this could drive flatter curves over time and reinforce the safe-haven status of these institutions. However, debt burdens are likely to worsen before productivity benefits from AI manifest, which could lead to higher term premia and steeper yield curves in the short term.

Additionally, high dispersion of outcomes across economies is expected based on their ability to benefit from the AI productivity boost.

The income and credit investor – Implications for credit markets are expected to be highly idiosyncratic and evolving. Developments such as those in the Digital Infrastructure Asset Backed Securities (ABS) space offer interesting opportunities for differentiated sources of yield. However, issuance trends, new debt structures and securitised pools, as well as the effect of AI adoption across industries and regions, need to be monitored.

 

A sector level insight into AI

 

Sector	Credit positive	Risk
Technology	These firms are central to AI infrastructure (chips, cloud, networking), with strong cash flows and investment-grade ratings supporting debt servicing.	Elevated capex and M&A (eg, Microsoft’s AI investments) may pressure free cash flow margins. Regulatory scrutiny and competitive intensity could compress margins.
Insurance	AI is transforming underwriting, claims, and fraud detection, improving operational efficiency and reserve adequacy.	Rising exposure to AI-related cyber threats and evolving underwriting models may introduce new forms of model risk.
Pharmaceuticals	AI accelerates drug discovery and clinical development, helping offset pricing pressure and improving time-to-market.	US policy changes (eg, Medicare Drug Price Negotiation) may compress margins, with AI only partially mitigating pricing headwinds.
Communications	AI enables network optimisation, customer service automation, and capex savings, supporting margin improvement and deleveraging.	High debt levels and legacy infrastructure pose challenges. Regulatory scrutiny (eg, environmental liabilities from wireline assets) adds complexity.
Electric Utilities	AI enhances grid stability, predictive maintenance, and renewable integration, improving operational efficiency.	Surging AI-related power demand (eg, data centres) strains infrastructure and may increase reliance on natural gas, raising sustainability concerns.

 

The active bond manager – While AI has the potential to democratise information and provide a greater number of investors with more power to make decisions, it can also lead to commoditised insights. In our view, the key to taking active risk remains in fundamental and proprietary research, enhanced by the use of AI, to drive differentiated insights. Additionally, trading in fixed income is set to undergo a transformation with AI, meaning dedicated trading capabilities to stay ahead of these trends become vital.

 

To read more, download the full article.

 

This insight is part of our broader analysis on how today’s global shifts are impacting investment opportunities – a dynamic we call The Great Global Restructuring. 

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