Vistra Adds 5,500 Megawatts to Fleet and Authorizes $1.5 Billion in Share Buybacks
Key Facts
Vistra completed its acquisition of Cogentrix on October 30, 2026, adding 10 natural gas-fired power generation facilities with capacity of about 5,500 megawatts, according to a company statement filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The company said its generation fleet reached about 50,000 megawatts after the deal. Cogentrix’s assets include plants in the PJM, ISO-NE and ERCOT markets, with listed capacity of 5,496 megawatts; Vistra owns all of the plants following the closing. Chief Executive Jim Burke said, "Natural gas plays a critical role in meeting the country's growing energy needs." He added that Cogentrix’s assets are a strategic fit for the company’s portfolio.
The deal announcement came alongside Vistra’s third-quarter results, released on November 6, which showed net income of $1,140 million, compared with $652 million in the same period of 2025. Adjusted EBITDA from continuing operations rose to $2,378 million from $1,581 million. The company attributed the increase in net income primarily to higher operating earnings and $375 million in unrealized gains on derivative positions. Adjusted earnings from continuing operations also increased by $797 million year over year. Vistra linked earnings growth to higher realized energy and capacity prices, contributions from the Lotus facilities and the return of Martin Lake 1 to service.
The board approved an additional $1.5 billion share repurchase authorization, with about $2.5 billion remaining available as of November 2. The company expects to use its remaining authorizations by the end of 2028. Vistra said repurchases since November 2021 had reduced shares outstanding by about 30% as of November 2, 2026, when the share count stood at about 339 million. The new authorization follows the deal financing: the company paid about $2.2 billion in cash and repaid about $1.7 billion of Cogentrix debt it assumed. It also redeemed $1 billion of Series A preferred shares and estimated pro forma available liquidity at about $5.4 billion after these transactions.
As part of its expansion, the Energy Harbor acquisition added about 4,000 megawatts of nuclear power in March 2024, followed by the Lotus deal, which added more than 2,300 megawatts from seven gas plants in October 2025. During the third quarter, Vistra announced the start of commercial operations at the 405-megawatt Pulaski solar facility under a power purchase agreement with Microsoft, and at the 100-megawatt Deer Creek solar and storage facility. It also announced a 20-year, 207-megawatt power purchase agreement with New Era Energy and Digital at the Odessa combined-cycle gas plant in Texas. The company said its fleet recorded operational availability of nearly 95% during a summer that saw record electricity demand in July in the ERCOT and PJM markets.
The company narrowed its 2026 adjusted earnings guidance range for continuing operations to $7.1–$7.5 billion and initiated 2027 guidance at $7.7–$8.5 billion. It set its 2026 range for free cash flow before growth from continuing operations at $4.3 billion to $4.7 billion, and its 2027 range at $4.3 billion to $5.1 billion. As of October 30, Vistra had hedged about 100% of expected generation volumes for 2026, 98% for 2027 and 78% for 2028. In premarket trading on November 6, the shares rose about 5% after the results, despite revenue coming in below analysts’ expectations, according to Investing.com.