Company: AWK
Filing Date: 2025-12-17
Form Type: S-4
Source: 0001193125-25-321389
Chunk: 74

Company: American Water Works Company, Inc.
Filing Date: 2025-12-17
Form: S-4
Chunk 74
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 company cannot assure that it will be able to continue paying quarterly dividends at American Water’s current rate, or to propose and/or maintain future quarterly dividend increases as planned. The combined company’s shareholders will have no contractual or other legal right to dividends that have not been declared by the combined company’s board of directors. American Water and Essential currently expect that the combined company will continue to pay dividends in an amount consistent with American Water’s dividend strategy and policy, and that the combined company will continue to propose future increases in its quarterly dividend rate consistent with American Water’s announced dividend growth strategy. However, there is no assurance that American Water’s shareholders will continue to receive payments of such dividends while the merger is pending, or that American Water’s and Essential’s shareholders will continue to receive payments of dividends following completion of the merger, for a number of reasons that include, for example:

| • |     | a lack of cash to pay such dividends, due to changes in cash requirements, capital spending plans, financing 
 agreements, cash flow or financial position;                                                                 |

| • |     | the board of directors may decide not to declare and pay quarterly dividends in accordance with historical 
 practice or American Water’s stated dividend strategy and policy, or at all;                               |

| • |     | the amount of quarterly dividends that may be paid to shareholders is subject to restriction under Delaware law                        
 and the combined company’s financing arrangements as well as compliance with American Water’s stated dividend strategy and policy; and |

| • |     | upstream dividend payments from subsidiaries may not be received in the same amount that such subsidiaries have                                                                          
 historically paid, and the ability of such subsidiaries to pay such dividends is subject to various risks and uncertainties described in each company’s respective filings with the SEC. |

45

Risks Related to American Water’s and Essential’s Businesses

American Water’s and Essential’s businesses are and will be subject to the risks described above. In addition, American Water and Essential are,
and will continue to be, subject to the risks described in American Water’s and Essential’s respective Annual Reports on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2024, as updated by
each of their respective subsequent Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q and Current Reports on Form 8-K, all of which are filed with the SEC and incorporated by reference
into this joint proxy statement/prospectus as set forth in “Where You Can Find More Information” beginning on page 182.

46

INFORMATION ABOUT THE PARTIES TO THE MERGER

American