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As he had against five merchant generators last year, California’s lieutenant governor Cruz Bustamante Wednesday filed a criminal lawsuit in a Los Angeles state Superior Court on behalf of the state’s taxpayers against 38 energy trader/marketers and two McGraw-Hill industry publications that publish natural gas price indices relied on by state officials and the market to establish energy prices.

The answer to the question of how many lawsuits can be aimed at one natural gas supplier, El Paso Natural Gas, came to the fore again Monday, and the answer: nobody knows! The lawsuits seem to continue unabated, with the latest being Nevada’s state consumer advocate in its attorney general’s office suing the Houston-based pipeline company for “perhaps hundreds of millions of dollars.”

The answer to the question of how many lawsuits can be aimed at one natural gas supplier, El Paso Natural Gas, came to the fore again Monday, and the Answer: nobody knows! The lawsuits seem to continue unabated, with the latest being Nevada’s state consumer advocate in its attorney general’s office suing the Houston-based pipeline company for “perhaps hundreds of millions of dollars.”

Duke Energy found itself backed into a corner last week, facing criticims for new reports about a formal SEC investigation, its 71% drop in third quarter earnings and its announcement that it may have to take a $19 million special charge in the fourth quarter related to a settlement agreement that was filed Tuesday with North Carolina and South Carolina state regulators (see related story).

Enron Corp. subsidiary EOTT Energy Partners, a major crude oil and natural gas liquids transporter and marketer, has been pulled down into Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection by its parent company. However, the company said its voluntary, pre-negotiated restructuring plan will give it an extra $100 million in working capital, and allow it to restructure debt and to continue operating normally. EOTT intends to rapidly emerge from bankruptcy as a legally separate company from Enron in early 2003.

Enron Corp. subsidiary EOTT Energy Partners, a major crude oil and natural gas liquids transporter and marketer, has been pulled down into Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection by its parent company. However, the company said its voluntary, pre-negotiated restructuring plan will give it an extra $100 million in working capital, and allow it to restructure debt and to continue operating normally. EOTT intends to rapidly emerge from bankruptcy as a legally separate company from Enron in early 2003.

Former Enron Corp. CFO Andrew Fastow and some of his subordinates may face criminal indictments by the end of next week, according to several reports. The sealed criminal grand jury indictment apparently includes fraud charges and other allegations, and Fastow is expected to turn himself in to authorities in Houston by Wednesday. Ironically, one of the attention-grabbing off-the-book partnerships created and managed by Fastow that destroyed Enron filed for bankruptcy last week.

LJM2 Co-Investment, which entered into 26 transactions with Enron Corp. over a two-year period to help conceal debt and move assets off of its balance sheet, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on Wednesday in Dallas. It was nearly one year ago that the infamous LJM entities first became news, after it was disclosed that they all had been set and managed until June 2001 by former CFO Andrew Fastow, who allegedly made more than $30 million on the side from the special purpose entities (see Daily GPI, Oct. 17, 2001; Oct. 24, 2001).

Still stinging from the National Energy Board’s (NEB) decision in June to cut back its requested rate of return over the past two years and reduce its proposed eastern zone tolls, TransCanada filed a request for review of the order along with an application for a new tolling structure on its Canadian mainline in 2003.