Coined

Former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan coined his famous phrase “irrational exuberance” in late 1996; what followed — albeit a few years later — was the dot-com bust. Now, nearly a decade later Greenspan’s prescient commentary is being applied to the exploration and production (E&P) industry.

Since coined by Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan back in 1995 to explain investors’ love of stocks, “irrational exuberance” has come to typify the stock market and its unprecedented bull rally. But last week as stock prices plummeted again, the phrase was a more apt description of the natural gas futures market, which spiked 14% amid bullish technicals unpinned by concerns over a tightness of supply this summer and next winter.

Since coined by Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan back in1995 to explain investors love of stocks, “irrational exuberance,”has come to typify the stock market and its unprecedented bullrally. But yesterday as stock prices plummeted again, “irrationalexuberance” was a more apt description of the natural gas futuresmarket, which spiked sharply amid a frenzy of short-covering andnew long accumulation. When all the dust had settled and the orderstabulated in the data room at Nymex, the numbers were staggering— the June contract rose a whopping 24.1 cents to finish at$2.689, setting a new 30-month high at $3.73 during a session thatsaw 102,978 contracts change hands.