Lift

Tennessee said operating conditions had improved enough Monday toallow it to lift an OFO Action Alert implemented Saturday (see DailyGPI, Nov. 12). Weekend OFOs by PacificGas & Electric, Southern California Gas and Northern Natural Gasalso were no longer in effect Monday.

It seems like a safe bet that early this week nobody could havepredicted big price increases anytime in the near future. Themarket’s bearish feeling at the time was palpable. But in somethingclose to a mirror image reversal of Tuesday’s big declines, tradersused an awesome display of might by futures to send cash priceshigher by a dime or more across the board Wednesday.

Regulations pertaining to the construction of new pipelineprojects took the spotlight at FERC last week, with the Commissionissuing a final rule aimed at updating and streamlining thecertificate process for new projects, while at the same timeproposing an initiative that would give landowners greaterparticipation in the process.

Regulations pertaining to the construction of new pipelineprojects took the spotlight at FERC yesterday, with the Commissionapproving a final rule aimed at updating and streamlining thecertificate process for new projects, including a change in thetimetable for the filing of project-related environmental data.FERC also proposed an initiative that would give landowners greaterparticipation in the certification process.

For the second Monday in a row the futures market kicked off theweek with a lower open, which featured bears as the earlyaggressors. That, however, is where the similarities between thetwo weeks ended. Whereas prices continued down the slippery slopelast Monday, yesterday’s trend was almost a straight line higher.Sources said a number of factors-technical short-covering,supportive weather forecasts and even a boost from the nearby crudeoil trading pit-were reasons for the 7-cent gain to $1.769 in Aprilfutures yesterday.

Taking a cue from a last-day uptick in the Henry Hub futurescontract for February, late-January cash prices ranged from flat toup about a nickel Wednesday. February bidweek numbers were alsomoving a bit higher in several instances, sources said.

The Midwest snowstorm that gave such a lift to the first dailyprices of 1999 was being repeated to a lesser degree over theweekend and Monday, but this time there were no gains of 20 centsor more as a result. Instead, most of the cash market was flat todown as much as a dime Monday. Still-massive storage inventories,along with forecasts of warming weather in the North and a fallingscreen, were cited as reasons for the softness. Several sources described trading action as subdued.

While deregulation at the retail level inches along at a snail’s pace, the online retail energy marketplace is quietly gaining market acceptance and could be become a real stimulant to competition.

In a huge turnaround of the cash market spurred by the arrivalof weather that finally appeared more wintry than springlike,prices were skyrocketing Monday from the abyss into which they hadsunk prior to the weekend. To say that double-digit increasescharacterized trading was a gross understatement when many pointswere rising by 50-60 cents or more.