Drops

Wrangling over two Oklahoma Natural Gas Co. (ONG) rate cases andunbundling of the ONG system continues in Oklahoma. OklahomaCorporation Commission Chairman Ed Apple last week voted against astipulated agreement between the commission and ONG. The agreement,which was killed in a 2-to-1 vote, had previously been appealed byOklahoma Attorney General Drew Edmondson. The AG maintained he wasdenied due process in negotiations between the commission and ONG.Edmondson also alleged ex parte communications took place betweenONG and Commissioner Denise Bode.

Wrangling over two Oklahoma Natural Gas Co. (ONG) rate cases andunbundling of the ONG system continues in Oklahoma. OklahomaCorporation Commission Chairman Ed Apple last week voted against astipulated agreement between the commission and ONG. The agreement,which was killed in a 2-to-1 vote, had previously been appealed byOklahoma Attorney General Drew Edmondson. The AG maintained he wasdenied due process in negotiations between the commission and ONG.Edmondson also alleged ex parte communications took place betweenONG and Commissioner Denise Bode.

Enough gas got traded early Thursday at prices within a penny ortwo of flat that late weakness reported at many points failed todrag down averages from Wednesday. However, the late downturns weretaken as a harbinger of continued softening today, especially withthe market subject to the normal drop in weekend demand. Themarket felt kind of juiced up Wednesday but was losing its steamThursday, according to a Southwest trader. He saw “some realsoftness” at the end in Permian Basin.

The Natural Gas Supply Association (NGSA) in a completeabout-face last week withdrew the civil fraud charges against aformer Canadian Embassy aide less than a month after bringing them.The reason given for the action was to encourage negotiationsbetween the two sides, but some took it as a sign that the chargesmay have been weak.

Enron Corp. has eliminated the last vestiges of its one-timehigh-profile venture into California’s residential electricitymarket by pulling out of its deal with the resort city of PalmSprings. Enron was the energy service provider for a citygovernment-established aggregation business, which had about 2,000mostly residential customers lured away from the local monopolyprovider, Southern California Edison.

Much of Monday’s swing market closely resembled that of Friday:flat to down 3-4 cents. But some points were conspicuous withsubstantially larger decreases. Since CIG and Public Service ofColorado ended price-boosting OFOs over the weekend, prices onCIG-North System and Questar fell by a little over a nickel. Thesteepest plunge by far of almost 20 cents came at CIG-DJ(Denver-Julesburg) Basin, which had soared by a similar amountlast Wednesday after PSCo declared a Restricted Delivery Daysituation.

The cash market split somewhat along geographical lines againMonday as overall softening grew greater going from West to East.Most Western points were flat to no more than 2-3 cents down, whileEastern declines mostly ranged from around a nickel to a dime.

Six inches of snow in New York wasn’t enough to convince futurestraders to resume the up-trend the American Gas Association storagereport so thoroughly wiped out last week. The April contract movedsharply lower for the third session in a row, closing down 4.2cents to $1.717. Shortly before the close, the contract broke belowwhat was deemed a key support level at $1.70 to post a low of$1.695 for the day. The $1.755 high was reached just after theopening bell.

The bearish American Gas Association storage report was too muchfor the April contract last week. Despite strength that sent thecontract to a new high of $1.965 last Wednesday, April ended theweek near its low, down 9.4 cents on news that a large storagesurplus remains. After falling 12.1 cents on Thursday, the contractattempted an initial push Friday morning but immediately loststeam, dropping sharply to a low of 1.750 only to zigzag sidewaysthe rest of the day before closing down 6.1 cents at $1.759/MMBtu.