Columbia Pipeline Group. Inc. (CPGX) said it raised about $1.4 billion from its public offering of 71.5 million shares. Underwriters exercised their option to purchase an additional 10.725 million shares, the company said.

Last week, Houston-based CPGX increased its offering from 51 million to 71.5 million shares, citing “strong demand” from investors, and raised the stock price to $17.50/share (see Daily GPI, Dec. 3). The offering was expected to bring in more than $1.25 billion, and allay financial analysts’ doubts that the company can fund billions of midstream investments in 2016.

On Monday, CPGX said net proceeds from the offering, after deducting underwriting discounts and estimated offering expenses payable by CPGX, were approximately $1.4 billion.

“CPGX’s successful equity offering eliminates the need for additional equity capital until 2017 and gives us the financial flexibility to be opportunistic in raising equity as we go forward and execute our business plan,” Robert C. Skaggs Jr., CEO of CPGX, said Monday.

“The fundamentals of our core business and our growth strategy remain squarely on track, and today’s successful equity offering allows the team to maintain its singular focus on the flawless execution of our business plan, including delivering our deep inventory of transformational investment opportunities on time and on budget. The completion of that backlog is expected to result in a tripling of the net investment of the company by 2020.”

Skaggs reaffirmed CPGX’s 2015 earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) outlook of $680 million, and said EBITDA would grow by an annual average of 20% through 2020. He also reaffirmed that average annual dividend and distribution growth rates at CPGX and Columbia Pipeline Partners LP (CPPL) — its midstream master limited partnership (MLP) — would grow by 15% and 20%, respectively, through 2020.

Last month, during CPGX’s presentation for the third quarter — its first as a publicly-traded company — financial analysts expressed concerns that the company and CPPL wouldn’t have enough capital to fund more than a dozen projects. Those projects, which include liquefied natural gas, midstream and interstate pipelines, are expected to cost more than $13 billion over the next five years (see Daily GPI, Nov. 3; May 14).

Backed by one of the nation’s largest utility companies, NiSource Inc., CPPL was spun off from CPGX in early February. An initial public offering (IPO) for the MLP raised about $1.1 billion after the sale of 46.8 million common units, shattering records and making it the largest IPO in history (see Shale Daily, Feb. 9). CPGX and Merrillville, IN-based NiSource completed their separation into two publicly-traded companies on July 1 (see Daily GPI, July 2).