HOUSTON (AP) _ Kinder Morgan Inc. (KMI) on Wednesday reported fourth-quarter profit of $607 million.

The Houston-based company said it had profit of 27 cents per share.

The results beat Wall Street expectations. The average estimate of eight analysts surveyed by Zacks Investment Research was for earnings of 24 cents per share.

The oil and natural gas pipeline and storage company posted revenue of $3.12 billion in the period, also beating Street forecasts. Four analysts surveyed by Zacks expected $3.06 billion.

For the year, the company reported profit of $119 million, or 5 cents per share. Revenue was reported as $11.7 billion.

Kinder Morgan expects full-year earnings to be 92 cents per share.

Kinder Morgan shares have increased 14% since the beginning of the year, while the Standard & Poor's 500 index has risen nearly 3%. In the final minutes of trading on Wednesday, shares hit $15.59, a drop of 26% in the last 12 months.

This story was generated by Automated Insights (http://automatedinsights.com/ap) using data from Zacks Investment Research. Access a Zacks stock report on KMI at https://www.zacks.com/ap/KMI

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