From my experience with motors, stoich being the lowest emitter of emissions, it also seems to provide the best performance for most street cars rather than running it rich. On most street cars rather than running "extra" fuel to provide "more" power I have found that by having the AFR perfectly stoich and sometimes even leaned just slightly it increases the volumetric and overall efficiency of the engine providing the most possible power output as well.
So agreed, this proceedure is for finding a stoich AFR.