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Capital Structure Financial Policies
12 Months Ended
Dec. 31, 2022
Capital Structure Financial Policies  
Capital Structure Financial Policies

28. Capital Structure Financial Policies

The company’s primary capital management strategy is to maintain a conservative balance sheet, which supports a solid investment grade credit rating profile. This objective affords the company the financial flexibility and access to the capital it requires to execute on its growth objectives.

The company’s capital is primarily monitored by reviewing the ratios of net debt to adjusted funds from operations(2) and total debt to total debt plus shareholders’ equity.

Net debt to adjusted funds from operations(2) is calculated as short-term debt plus total long-term debt less cash and cash equivalents, divided by adjusted funds from operations for the year then ended.

Total debt to total debt plus shareholders’ equity is calculated as short-term debt plus total long-term debt divided by short-term debt plus total long-term debt plus shareholders’ equity. This financial covenant under the company’s various banking and debt agreements shall not be greater than 65%.

The company’s financial covenant is reviewed regularly and controls are in place to maintain compliance with the covenant. The company complied with financial covenants for the years ended December 31, 2022 and 2021. The company’s financial measures, as set out in the following schedule, were unchanged from 2021. The company believes that achieving its capital target helps to provide the company access to capital at a reasonable cost by maintaining solid investment grade credit ratings. Total debt to total debt plus shareholders’ equity was 28.4% at December 31, 2022 and decreased due to lower debt levels and higher shareholders’ equity as a result of increased net earnings. The company operates in a fluctuating business environment and ratios may periodically fall outside of management’s targets. The company addresses these fluctuations by capital expenditure reductions and sales of non-core assets to ensure net debt achieves management’s targets.

    

Capital

    

    

  

Measure

December 31

December 31

 

($ millions)

Target

2022

2021

 

Components of ratios

 

  

 

  

 

  

Short-term debt

 

  

 

2 807

 

1 284

Current portion of long-term debt

 

  

 

-

 

231

Current portion of long-term lease liabilities

317

310

Long-term debt

 

  

 

9 800

 

13 989

Long-term lease liabilities

2 695

2 540

Total debt(1)

 

  

 

15 619

 

18 354

Less: Cash and cash equivalents

 

  

 

1 980

 

2 205

Net debt(1)

 

  

 

13 639

 

16 149

Shareholders’ equity

 

  

 

39 367

 

36 614

Total capitalization (total debt plus shareholders’ equity)

 

  

 

54 986

 

54 968

Adjusted funds from operations(2)

 

  

 

18 101

 

10 257

Net debt to adjusted funds from operations

 

<3.0 times

 

0.8

 

1.6

Total debt to total debt plus shareholders’ equity

20% - 35%

28.4%

33.4%

(1)Total debt and net debt are non-GAAP financial measures.
(2)Adjusted funds from operations is calculated as cash flow from operating activities before changes in non-cash working capital, and is a non-GAAP financial measure.