Sends

Natural gas futures dropped to new nine-month lows Thursday morning on the news that a whopping 102 Bcf was added to underground storage facilities last week. After having teetering precariously above support at $4.55 both on Wednesday and then again on Thursday morning, the October contract was ushered lower in a wave of knee-jerk selling after the 10:30 a.m. EDT report.

Mirant Corp. shares plummeted 16% last Thursday to $2.28 following a downgrade to “sell” from “neutral” by Merrill Lynch analyst Elizabeth Parrella. She said the chances are increasing that the company will miss today’s deadline to gain approval from banks of its plan to refinance $4.9 billion of debt.

Mirant Corp. shares plummeted 16% Thursday to $2.28 following a downgrade to “sell” from “neutral” by Merrill Lynch analyst Elizabeth Parrella. She said the chances are increasing that the company will miss its July 14 deadline to gain approval from banks of its plan to refinance $4.9 billion of debt.

To absolutely no one’s surprise, all points recorded major declines in swing trading for the weekend. Friday’s market had a lot going against it: the screen plunge a day earlier that was linked to the latest record-setting storage injection; the disappearance of very hot weather almost everywhere except for the desert Southwest and inland California; and the normal industrial load drop that accompanies a weekend.

The Missouri Court of Appeals for the Western District last week sent Aquila’s two-year-old purchase of St. Joseph Light & Power Co. back to the Missouri Public Service Commission. After an appeal by St. Joseph’s customer AG Processing, the court found that the PSC failed to decide whether the $92 million premium paid for the utility should be recovered from its customers as approved.

The Missouri Court of Appeals for the Western District in Kansas City has sent back to the Missouri Public Service Commission Aquila Inc.’s $270 million two-year-old purchase of St. Joseph Light & Power Co. After an appeal by St. Joseph’s customer AG Processing, the court found that the PSC failed to decide whether the $92 million premium paid for the utility should be recovered from its customers as approved.

Dollar-plus gains at all Northeast citygates and on Dominion in Appalachia were mixed into overall cash spikes Tuesday. Upticks of half a dollar or greater were consistent throughout the East and in the Waha/Permian Basin markets. The rest of the West tended to lag behind but still saw fairly strong advances of about 20-30 cents or so.

A federal appeals court in Washington, DC has sent back for the second time a FERC decision rejecting Transcontinental Gas Pipe Line Corp.’s bid to charge shippers firm-to-the-wellhead (FTW) transportation rates similar to those enjoyed by its competitors.

A finding last week by a regulatory judge that power generators don’t owe California anywhere near the $8.9 billion in overcharges claimed by the governor for power deliveries in 2000-2001 didn’t play well in Hollywood or its environs, but Wall Street appeared to like it a lot.