FirstEnergy selects buyer of retail business
Chicago firm makes deal for $140 million
FirstEnergy Solutions Corp., one of the bankrupt subsidiaries of Akron-based FirstEnergy Corp., has picked Exelon Generation Co. as a buyer for its retail business.
If the deal goes through, it would give Chicago-based Exelon the accounts of thousands of commercial, industrial, government and nonprofit customers who selected FirstEnergy Solutions as their electricity provider and those for whom FirstEnergy was a provider of last resort.
The majority of the company’s clients are in Pennsylvania and Ohio.
This would not have an impact on a customer’s utility. The sale also does not include any of FirstEnergy’s bankrupt power plants, such as Beaver Valley nuclear station and the coal-fired Bruce Mansfield plant.
The proposed $140 million sale sets up Exelon as a stalking horse bidder — the one to beat in a public auction that would take place Sept. 6.
FirstEnergy Solutions said in a bankruptcy court filing that it had whittled the number of interested suitors from 35 in February to two in May. It then selected Exelon as the best bidder.
According to a filing from Kevin Warvell, CFO of FirstEnergy Solutions, the company had $824 million in committed sales for the rest of this year, but projected that would drop to $48 million by 2022.
He cited trouble signing up new customers, in part because the company is in bankruptcy and its future was uncertain.
The stalking horse bid and bidding procedure must still be approved by FirstEnergy’s bankruptcy judge.