Good day ladies and gentlemen and welcome to the NiSource Third Quarter 2015 Earnings Conference Call. As a reminder, today's conference call is being recorded. I would now like to turn the call over to your first speaker for today, Randy Hulen. You have the floor, sir.

Thank you, Andrew, and good morning. On behalf of everyone at NiSource, welcome to our quarterly analyst call. Joining me on the call this morning is Joe Hamrock, Chief Executive Officer and Donald Brown, Chief Financial Officer. As you know, the focus of today's call is to review NiSource's financial performance for the third quarter of 2015 as well as to provide an overall business update on the utility operations and our growth drivers. We will then open the call up to your questions. As a reminder, we will be referring to our supplemental slides that are available on the NiSource website. Before getting into the key takeaways for the quarter, I wanted to remind everyone that we successfully completed the separation of Columbia Pipeline Group, July 1. Results for CPG are now classified as discontinued operations. And finally, before turning the call over to Joe, I'd like to remind all of you that some of the statements made on this call will be forward looking. These statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed in the statements. Information concerning such risks and uncertainties is included in the MD&A and Risk Factors sections of our periodic SEC filings. Having covered all those reminders, I'd like to turn the call over to Joe. Joseph J. Hamrock - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Thanks, Randy. Good morning everyone and thank you for joining us. Today, we'll briefly cover our third quarter 2015 results and earnings drivers before discussing specific highlights for several of our utilities. We'll close with the review of our investment proposition and long-range business plan. And we'll leave plenty of time for your questions. As you'll hear throughout today's call, our results and our look ahead reinforced the…

We'll begin with a first question from Paul Ridzon from KeyBanc. Your line is open.

Good morning. How are you? Joseph J. Hamrock - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Good morning, Paul. How are you?

Fine, thank you. You had a pretty nice swing at the LDC operations. I know it's on (16:46) new rates, but was there any rate design in there and maybe more fixed cost recovery? Joseph J. Hamrock - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: No, nothing substantial in terms of the shift in the rate design on the LDC side of the business; just continued execution of the investment plan and regulatory cadence across really all of the states with the mix of base rate case outcomes and tracker mechanisms contributing to the revenue side of the equation. And I would add disciplined expense control across the business as well.

Thank you. And what are you seeing as far as demand from your steel customers and kind of what's the outlook there for the next 12, 18 months? Joseph J. Hamrock - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Yeah, those are as you know very important customers to us, a critical part of the Northwest Indiana economy. And we've been very tuned in to the pressure they've been under from international trade and have seen signs of moderation in that this year, but still a very flat load profile on the industrial particularly the steel side. It's important to note that 2014 was a bit of an anomaly in terms of the load from that sector with them depending more on our generation than their own internal generation in that year due to weather conditions and operating conditions. But nonetheless, on a moderate to mid-term basis, we're off by probably 7% or so on a year-to-date basis on the steel load in Northwest Indiana and we'd expect slow recovery, slow and steady recovery. The other side of that though, Paul, is we're seeing really strong signs of economic development in other parts of the Northwest Indiana economy that while not completely offsetting the steel issues, certainly provides some stability for us.

Can you give us a sense of the difference in margin between selling to a steel customer and just selling on the open market? Donald E. Brown - Executive Vice President, Chief Financial Officer & Treasurer: Well the open market these days is pretty flat in the MISO region. So in the short-term view, I'd say that's not a very favorable equation in general. But I couldn't give you offhand a difference in the margin between the two and it's certainly part of the electric rate case that's filed that's in front of us for next year.

Thank you very much. Joseph J. Hamrock - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Thank you, Paul. Have a good day.

You too.

Our next question comes from the line of Andy Levi from Avon Capital. Your line is open.

Hi. Good morning guys. Joseph J. Hamrock - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Good morning Andy.

I may be the last one, because I just dialed in. So let's see. Joseph J. Hamrock - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: You're welcome.

But just on the (19:35), you mentioned that last year was abnormally high. Was that what, like some co-gen units down or something like that or? Joseph J. Hamrock - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Yeah, that's exactly right. Last winter was the harsh operating conditions in the weather. Some of the industrials were not able to run internal generation, so we served that load and that contributed to an uptick in the 2014 industrial load profile relative to what I would call normal in the prior couple of years. So if you looked at 2015 over versus maybe a three to five year strip of the prior of years, it's pretty consistent with the prior years in general but off of 2014 because of that.

So really I guess for that sensitivity, what you're saying is go back to 2013? Joseph J. Hamrock - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Yeah, that's a good, probably a good representative indicator of what we might see in a quote/unquote normal year.

So on a – again, I won't hold you to the exact number but maybe you can give us a ballpark. On normalized basis, any idea where you think industrial sales are down, because of steel or just in general? Joseph J. Hamrock - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Yeah, I'd call it relatively flat on a normalized basis right now, and the outlook will be continued relatively flat load from that sector.

Okay, that's good to hear. And then as far as, so when you file this rate case in Indiana, I guess there won't be any reason to incorporate in your rate case a lower sales level for industrial or will that be a component of it? Joseph J. Hamrock - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: It's always a part of any rate case and just in terms of revenue allocation across different customer groups. Keep in mind the test year goes through end of March of this year, 2015, so that's the load profile. That's the starting point for the rate case and reflects a little bit of that but doesn't give you a full picture of the outlook for industrial. So you'll see a little bit of that in the rate case. A little bit of adjustment for that.

Okay. And then my last question is, obviously since your last call, there have been two acquisitions within the sector that had some unbelievable premiums paid, which was what your stock – basically, if you kind of took the PE ratio, it was almost double, so maybe not quite. But the point being is, just what are your thoughts on that and does that change the dynamics of your thinking going forward? Joseph J. Hamrock - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Yeah, yeah. I haven't seen anything that would double, but that would be interesting. I won't speculate on M&A, Andy. Certainly we're watching with interest the recent announcements in our space. But we remain very focused on our plan, which delivers sustained growth through the clearly identified $30 billion of regulated infrastructure investments. And as you know, that's well supported by our stakeholders. And we're well capitalized with significant scale to continue to execute on that. So that's what we're focused on and we'll remain focused on that.

Okay, and one more question. Just, you had thrown out a growth rate – or earnings estimates I should say, and a growth rate, when you came off the spin. Any way to categorize kind of how you're doing relative to plan, just specifically on the rate cases? Joseph J. Hamrock - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Yeah, I'd say we're on plan as we speak, as we look at the 2015 performance year to date. We're on plan. Lots of puts and takes within the plan, but certainly right about where we would expect to be. Our outlook remains confident around the range we've provided for next year as well as the long-term growth rate of 4% to 6% EPS and dividend growth.

Thank you very much. Thank you, guys. Joseph J. Hamrock - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Thank you. Have a good day.

Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Charles Fishman from Morningstar. Your line is open.

Good morning. Joseph J. Hamrock - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Good morning, Charles.

I realize you're not giving any CapEx forecast beyond 2016, but just in sort of a big picture look – electric, you got Schahfer, Michigan City, will be winding down if not done by 2017. Will the modernization plan you think kick off by then that you'll still maintain a CapEx spend on the electric side of about $400 million plus per year? Joseph J. Hamrock - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Yeah, Charles, that's a good way to describe it. We've always portrayed the electric (24:32) ramping up over time. In the original filing, the original plan, that's what it reflected. As you know, we'll file a new plan starting with 2016 investments by the beginning of next year. And you would expect to see that same kind of a ramp rate in that plan as we go forward. We remain very committed to those investments. We think they're essential. And it will basically fill in, if you think about NIPSCO's total CapEx profile, it will basically fill in over time as the generation investments ramp down and ramp off.

Yeah, and is that your plan to give like a two-year forecast going out on CapEx so you'll roll this sometime next year or early next year? Joseph J. Hamrock - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Yeah, we haven't stated that. We haven't indicated that we've put a specific two-year plan in place. But I would say the $1.4 billion that we've committed to for 2016 is a good indicator of where we expect to be over the long run with a modest general upward bias to that number.

And just, I just opened my model and I have rate base growth of around 8% on the Electric side, but I think that's pre-separation. Is that still a decent number or close number? Joseph J. Hamrock - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Yeah.

Or do you update that? Joseph J. Hamrock - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: In general – you said on the electric side. In general across NiSource, we're going to run 6% to 8% rate base growth over the long run. And that'll move a little bit between Electric and Gas. But it's a good range for both segments.

Okay. I tell you what, I got a couple more but I'll save them for EEI. Joseph J. Hamrock - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: All right. Look forward to seeing you.

Thank you.

Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Steve Fleishman from Wolfe Research. Your line is open.

Yeah, hi. Good morning. Joseph J. Hamrock - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Good morning, Steve.

Hi. So just on the guidance for 2016, just any color where you think you might be tracking within that range looking ahead? And just, I guess the industrial – Indiana maybe a little pressure. The gas utility is doing really well. Just maybe any high level thoughts on how you're tracking for looking into next year? Joseph J. Hamrock - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Yeah, that's a fair question. We're not yet ready to narrow or revise guidance for next year. So, certainly not in that position yet. And I think you've fairly characterized some of the major drivers. If you look at really any given year in our planning horizon, regulatory outcomes are the likely swing factors within the guidance. And so as we look at the electric case at NIPSCO, certainly one of the factors that could move the needle a bit within guidance. But we're confident in that range and very confident in the kind of the middle of that range.

Okay. And then going forward, I'm just curious, will you continue to give kind of a one-year forward or two-year forward guidance or it was just kind of because it was the first year of the breakup, i.e., in early 2016 are you going to give a view for 2017 as well? Joseph J. Hamrock - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: We have not decided that yet. We certainly guided early for 2016 because of the separation, and we thought it was appropriate to come out as we separated NiSource and CPG for both sides to give a good look at the first full year of operations. Whether we'll look that far out in the future is yet to be determined.

Okay. Thank you. Joseph J. Hamrock - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: Thank you. Have a good day.

Thank you. I'm not seeing any other questioners in the queue at this time, so I'd like to turn the call back over to management for closing remarks. Joseph J. Hamrock - President, Chief Executive Officer & Director: All right, Andrew, thank you very much. And thank you all again for participating today and for your ongoing interest in NiSource. We certainly look forward to sharing continued updates on our progress, and meeting with you, many of you at EEI next week. So have a great day. Take care.