Danny

Danny, which was named 2015’s first Atlantic hurricane on Thursday, became a major hurricane Friday, boasting maximum sustained winds of 115 mph as it moved slowly about 900 miles east of the Leeward Islands, according to the National Hurricane Center (NHC).

Traders Friday saw no reason to commit to extended three-day deals when weather forecasts for major metropolitan areas looked to be near-normal if not below normal temperature patterns.

There were a lot of long faces in both the energy and financial markets for the week ended Aug. 21. Natural gas physical and futures both sustained a double-digit drubbing and the NGI Weekly Spot Gas Average fell 14 cents to $2.54. That, however, paled in comparison to the 531-point swan dive the Dow Jones Industrial Average took on Friday.

Natural gas traders generally took cover Thursday until the Energy Information Administration (EIA) released storage figures for the week ending Aug. 14 and they could assess the impact of a modest degree of cooling.

Enterprise Products Partners LP, Enbridge Energy Partners LP and Anadarko Petroleum Corp. are partnering on a new natural gas liquids (NGL) pipeline from Skellytown, TX in Carson County to NGL fractionation and storage facilities in Mont Belvieu, TX. The new system would benefit takeaway capacity from the Barnett Shale as well as from other plays.

A subsidiary of Houston-based Helix Energy Solutions agreed to sell a 30% working interest in its Gulf of Mexico Danny Noonan discoveries on Garden Banks blocks 463, 506 and 507, as well as other Outer Continental Shelf assets on East Cameron blocks 371 and 381, to a private independent in two separate transactions for a total of $165 million. Additional cash payments of up to $20 million may be paid to Energy Resource Technology GOM Inc. based upon certain field production milestones, Helix said. The new partner also will pay a 30% share of all future capital expenditures related to the exploration and development of these fields. Most of the transaction already has been funded, and the parties expect to complete the sale by the end of April. “As we have stated, our intention during 2008 is to unlock a portion of the value in our oil and gas portfolio through the monetization of certain reserves,” said Helix CEO Owen Kratz. “These sales are the first of such efforts that we believe will allow us to demonstrate the value created through our unique two-stranded approach to oil and gas exploration and production and will allow us to recover previously invested capital, reduce future capital expenditure requirements related to these developments and reduce the profit deferral in our services division associated with the development work.”