NextEra Energy Capital Holdings, Inc.

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1 CREDIT OPINION NextEra Energy Capital Holdings, Inc. NextEra's Guaranteed Financing Subsidiary Update Summary Rating Rationale RATINGS NextEra Energy Capital Holdings, Inc. Domicile Juno Beach, Florida, United States Long Term Rating Type Senior Unsecured - Fgn Curr Please see the ratings section at the end of this report for more information. The ratings and outlook shown reflect information as of the publication date. Contacts Swami Venkataraman, CFA Senior Vice President swami.venkat@moodys.com Michael G. Haggarty Associate Managing Director michael.haggarty@moodys.com Jim Hempstead MD-Utilities james.hempstead@moodys.com NextEra Energy Capital Holdings, Inc. (NEECH, stable) is a guaranteed subsidiary of NextEra Energy, Inc. (NEE, stable), one of the largest hybrid power and utility companies in the US and the owner of the utility Florida Power and Light Company (FPL, A1 stable). NEECH's rating reflects NEE's unconditional guarantee of all of its debt and payment obligations. Consequently, NEECH's rating reflects the consolidated financial strength of the entire NEE organization, including NEER s power projects (48% of NEE s segment assets before corporate and other items) and FPL (52% of NEE s assets). NEER has a large, diverse portfolio of renewables assets with good operating performance. NEECH s credit metrics are improving as new projects at NEER come on line. Given the weak outlook for wholesale power generation, NEECH is de-emphasizing merchant power activities and focusing on lower-risk contracted and regulated businesses, including gas and electric transmission assets. This Credit Opinion focuses on the non-fpl aspects of NEE. For further detail, please refer to our research on NEE (for discussion on a consolidated basis) and FPL. Credit Strengths Growing clean-energy portfolio with emphasis on contracted assets Diversification into low-risk, regulated or contracted infrastructure businesses Improving credit metrics Credit Challenges Large negative free cash flow and $6.3 billion funding gap Project execution risk at the peak of the construction cycle Significant structural subordination Rating The stable outlook is based on our expectation that projects coming on line over the next few years will improve NEECH's credit metrics such that CFO pre-wc/debt will be in the mid-teens. Assuming FPL s CFO pre-wc/debt remains in the 30% range, NEECH s ratios in the teens would sustain NEE s consolidated CFO pre-wc/debt ratios above 20%. We also expect NEECH will continue to lower its business risk by increasing the level of long-term contracts and reducing its exposure to merchant activities.

2 Factors that Could Lead to an Upgrade An upgrade is unlikely in the foreseeable future, with NEECH continuing to outspend its operating cash flow for renewable projects and gas pipelines, and is linked to an upgrade at NEE. Factors that Could Lead to a Downgrade A downgrade for NEE and NEECH could result if NEE s consolidated CFO pre-wc/debt is sustained below 20% as a result of inadequate debt reduction or lower cash flow from new power plants. Downgrades could also result if the holding company guaranteed debt at NEECH is sustained above 40% of NEE s consolidated debt. Detailed Rating Considerations GROWING CLEAN ENERGY PORTFOLIO WITH AN EMPHASIS ON CONTRACTED ASSETS NEER has a large, diverse generation portfolio, and is the top owner of wind and solar generation in the US. As of 30 June 2017, NEER owned approximately 20 gigawatts (GW) of generating capacity that was diversified across 29 states and Canada. Of this capacity, 17% was located in Texas, 25% in MISO (Midwest), 24% in western US, 12% in New England, 17% in the South, and 5% in Canada. NEER also owns a 100 megawatt (MW) solar plant in Spain. During 2016, NEER generated power mostly from renewables (52% from wind, 5% from solar) and low/no carbon fuels (13% from natural gas, 30% from nuclear). The improving economics of renewables provides NEER with opportunities to sell renewable energy under long-term contracts, mostly to investment grade utilities seeking to satisfy environmental mandates as well as customer preferences. The long term revenue visibility from the contracted assets and the predominance of renewables, which typically entail little fuel risk or capex after construction, result in NEER having lower business risk than those unregulated power companies that are exposed to merchant power sales and challenged coal and nuclear plants. Although there is somewhat greater uncertainty over environmental policy and supportiveness for renewables after the US exit from the Paris accords and the withdrawal of the Clean Power Plan, tax incentives for renewables continue to remain in place through the end of the decade (2022 for solar) and will continue to support strong growth for NEER over the medium term. With many utilities having met their renewable portfolio standards, NEER is looking to contracts with large corporations in that would further diversify its customer base before utilities are expected to come back to the market as major buyers towards the end of the decade. NEER s cash flow has risen from new generation capacity that has been added over the last several years. NEER times its construction to make the most of the federal tax credits available for renewable projects. The company is in the midst of such a construction wave, with capex estimated at around $ billion in 2017 and around $ billion in 2018, largely due to increased renewables investment. NEER has signed contracts that would grow its renewable capacity by 4 GW or over 25% through 2020, though the company expects to develop over 10 GW during this period. DIVERSIFICATION INTO LOW-RISK REGULATED OR CONTRACTED INFRASTRUCTURE BUSINESSES As part of its strategy, NEECH is investing in gas pipelines and electric transmission as regulated and/or contracted businesses, which will diversify its growth beyond renewable projects. The company is also beginning to make small but growing investments in energy storage, which is not only a major renewable technology growth area by itself but will also support further growth in wind and solar installations. NEECH is developing three federally regulated gas pipelines. The $1.5 billion Sabal Trail and the related $500 million Florida Southeast Connection gas pipes came on line in June of 2017, and the $1 billion Mountain Valley pipeline is due to be completed in These pipelines will generate stable cash flow under 20-year contracts and will help support the strengthening of NEE s credit metrics in the period. NextEra Energy Transmission (NEET) has won federally regulated greenfield projects in Canada and California, as regulators have opened up transmission development to parties other than incumbent utilities. NEET will invest a total of $200 million to construct two projects in California (Suncrest and Estrella, in service in 2017 and 2019, respectively) and in Ontario (East-West Tie Line, in service in 2020). This publication does not announce a credit rating action. For any credit ratings referenced in this publication, please see the ratings tab on the issuer/entity page on for the most updated credit rating action information and rating history. 2

3 NEP: SUPERIOR YIELDCO WITH A PORTFOLIO OF POWER AND PIPELINE ASSETS NEP has a well diversified portfolio by geography, by number of projects as well as by fuel. NEP has 2.6 GW of wind; 442 MW of solar and 4 bcf/day of gas pipelines (3 bcf/day with long-term contracts) spread over 23 projects and seven pipelines. The projects are located in three broadly diversified regions the west coast, the southern great plains and the upper midwest and Canada. All projects benefit from fixed price, long-term contracts, most with strong investment grade counterparties, with an average remaining life of about 18 years. Upcoming governance changes at NEP will have mixed credit implications, with features that both strengthen its attractiveness to investors but which also reduce the benefit that NEP receives from being a part of NEE. The yieldco sector still faces challenging capital market conditions, especially equity pricing, which makes issuing equity on an accretive basis difficult. While NEP has been the best performing among all listed yieldcos to date, it has also seen a drop in equity valuations from the peak in 2015 (although prices have started to recover as of late). Changes to NEP s IDR structure and other changes reflect an attempt to improve capital market access. This is balanced by the recognition that a lack of growth is not necessarily credit negative for yieldcos, unless management seeks to grow purely through the issuance of debt. NEP's leveraged financial profile is a limiting factor to its credit quality. Should NEP continue to add to its asset base in the next few years, we expect that it would do so while maintaining leverage that is below 7.0x on a Debt/EBITDA basis and CFO pre-wc / debt in the range of 9-11%. IMPROVING CREDIT METRICS, SIGNIFICANT STRUCTURAL SUBORDINATION As of 31 March 2017, NEECH had $21.8 billion of total debt (64% of NEE reported consolidated debt), of which NEE guaranteed roughly $11 billion (34% of NEE consolidated debt) at NEECH's holdco-level. Approximately $3.5 billion of the NEECH holdco obligations are junior subordinated hybrid debt, to which we assign a 25% equity credit in our standard adjustments. These hybrid securities can be valuable in providing a loss cushion for senior creditors. The $11 billion of NEECH holdco debt is structurally subordinated to $9.5 billion of non-recourse debt, mostly at NEER s power projects. (NEECH holdco debt is also structurally subordinated to $12 billion of debt at FPL.) Much of this non-recourse debt is tied to NEE and/or NEECH in some way, either through sponsorship of the underlying projects; tax interrelationships including guarantees of production tax credits on wind projects; or cash traps at some projects that are tied to NEECH's ratings. These projects are important to NEE's shareholder growth and generate valuable tax benefits. However, NEE divests projects regularly, and at times has shown it would not support a non-recourse project, as demonstrated a few years ago after a billion-dollar Spanish solar project defaulted after the government unexpectedly changed its tariffs. Although NEECH and NEER are significant entities with substantial amounts of debt outstanding, they do not file their own audited SEC financial statements, which would be useful in their credit analysis. NEE also does not file credit agreements with the SEC. NEE does publish consolidating financial statements that provide a condensed view of NEECH's standalone financial metrics. NEECH's credit metrics have improved from a nadir hit in 2012, its largest-ever construction year at the time, when it spent $5 billion in capital expenditures, about 5 times its cash flow from operations. Cash flow from operations has almost doubled since then, as projects came on line. Likewise, NEECH's cash flow from operations before working capital-to-debt (CFO pre-wc/debt) has increased from 6% in 2012 to 11.5% in LTM June 2017, although weaker than FPL's ratio of 39%, resulting in NEE s consolidated ratio in the middle around 20%. We expect NEECH's CFO pre-wc/debt to stay in the low to mid teens over the next couple of years. Liquidity Analysis NEECH's liquidity is constrained by the need to finance its large capital program, to refinance a substantial amount of debt maturities, and to provide for material contingent calls related to its hedging and marketing activities. However, the company has demonstrated good access to bank and debt capital markets to maintain its liquidity. NEECH's LTM June 2017 operating cash flow of $2.1 billion would meet only a third of its capex of $6.0 billion. In addition, as of 30 June 2017, NEECH had $2.4 billion of current debt: $1.1 billion of commercial paper, $0.7 billion of other debt at the NEECH holdco, and $0.7 billion of self-amortization of non-recourse project loans at NEER. NEECH expects to finance the resulting funding gap of $6.3 3

4 billion through a combination of project finance debt, tax equity, debt and by selling projects (outright or equity stakes) to third parties and to NEP. NEECH has $7.0 billion of credit facilities at the NEECH holdco. The largest piece is the NEECH holdco s $4.96 billion of committed revolvers (the backup facility for its CP program). The majority of this facility expires in In addition, NEER maintains various loan facilities and revolvers for its construction projects. NEP also has $0.4 billion in revolvers. NEECH does not have a material adverse change clause in its bank credit facilities, although it does have a NEE consolidated debt-to-capitalization covenant, for which the company was in compliance as of 30 June Profile NEECH is the principal debt financing vehicle for NEE s non-fpl businesses. NEECH s largest subsidiary is NextEra Energy Resources (NEER, not rated), an intermediate holding company for NEE s independent power projects and its yieldco, NextEra Energy Partners, LP (NEP, Ba1 stable), and interests in natural gas pipelines. NEECH s other subsidiaries include NextEra Energy Transmission (NEET), which holds assets in electric transmission. Ratings Exhibit 1 Category NEXTERA ENERGY CAPITAL HOLDINGS, INC. Bkd Senior Unsecured Bkd Jr Subordinate BACKED Pref. Shelf Commercial Paper Moody's Rating Baa2 (P)Baa3 P-2 PARENT: NEXTERA ENERGY, INC. Issuer Rating Senior Unsecured Shelf Jr Subordinate Shelf Pref. Shelf (P) (P)Baa2 (P)Baa3 Source: Moody's Investors Service 4

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