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It is often said that markets will fall twice as fast as theyrise and that was never more true than yesterday in the natural gaspit at Nymex. After climbing steadily over the past week to the$4.555 level Wednesday, the market was flushed lower yesterday amida torrent of profit-taking that in turn, triggered a wave ofsell-stop loss orders. Bargain hunting was seen late to stem theprice erosion, but the damage was already done.

June prices were still on the rise for a California buyerTuesday, but a producer said he was seeing slightly lower Chicagocitygates.

Acknowledging its significant improvement in company performanceand shareholder value in the past year, Equitable Resources haspromoted Murry S. Gerber to chairman of the board of directors.Gerber has served as president and CEO since joining Equitable in1998.

Dominion Resources Inc. last week announced a new corporatestructure that will integrate the assets of Consolidated NaturalGas Co., which it merged with in January, and will streamlineoperations.

After 18 months in the making, the much-anticipated mega-rule,initiating a host of post-Order 636 gas transportation and ratereforms made its public debut last week. The rule got good reviewsfrom pipeline customers but immediate criticism from a majorinterstate pipeline.

Whether it was too much holiday turkey or possibly just a postY2K letdown, the natural gas futures market began the year insomewhat of a funk last week as traders showed an unwillingness topush prices very much on either side of unchanged.

Houston-based Conoco, which recently came out from under thewing of DuPont, launched a corporate advertising campaign that willtout its ability to compete against the “super-majors.” Conococompleted its separation in August and returned to the New YorkStock Exchange, trading under the symbols COC.A and COC.B.

Houston-based Conoco, which recently came from under the wing ofDuPont, launched a corporate advertising campaign that will toutits ability to compete against the “super-majors.” Conoco completedits separation in August and returned to the New York StockExchange, trading under the symbols COC.A and COC.B.

One day after concluding its purchase of Sonat Inc., El PasoEnergy Corp. completed its after-merger corporate restructuring.Through normal attrition, early retirement and 607 layoffs, thework force has been pared down from 5,500 to 4,575, the companysaid Tuesday. The action is part of a company-wide plan toimplement the optimal corporate organization for the future, ElPaso said, and the company expects to save in excess of $100million in the first full year after the merger due to thesemeasures.