Institutions

Add the U.S. Treasury to the long list of institutions launching investigations in the wake of Enron Corp.’s collapse. U.S. regulations that protect investors are being reviewed by the department, Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill said Sunday. O’Neill, speaking on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” said “it is not clear whether the company fulfilled all of its obligations under the existing rules,” regarding rules that allowed Enron’s management to sell stock while its employees were barred from doing the same thing.

The Enron calamity dragged down many energy company stocks Wednesday and the stocks of some financial institutions, particularly Citigroup and JP Morgan Chase & Co., which were working on the now defunct $8.4 billion Enron-Dynegy merger. Many energy companies, however, said they have had weeks to prepare for this and have reduced their Enron exposures to manageable levels.

In a 10-Q filing made after the close of the stock market on Monday, Enron Corp. revealed it will have to find some collateral to guarantee some of its debts, or it could be forced to pay off a $690 million note by next week, and a total of almost $3.9 billion more if its credit ratings drop another notch.

IntercontinentalExchange, founded earlier this year by leadingU.S. and European financial institutions and energy and naturalresource firms, has chosen IXnet, a Global Crossing, Ltd. company,to fully manage its global transaction network. IXnet is thedeveloper of an intelligent, high-performance global Extranetdesigned principally for the financial services community.IntercontinentalExchange is scheduled to begin trading preciousmetals in August, with OTC energy products, including natural gas,slated for Q4. The exchange’s partners include American ElectricPower, Aquila Energy, BP Amoco, Deutsche Bank AG, Duke Energy, ElPaso Energy, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley Dean Witter, ReliantEnergy, Royal Dutch/Shell Group, SG Investment Banking, SouthernCompany Energy Marketing, Totalfina Elf, and Continental PowerExchange