Settle

Canadian 88 Energy Corp. and Canadian Superior Energy Inc., involved in litigation over the past several months that played out loudly and often in the press, announced Friday that “all issues and all litigation between them” — including between former Canadian 88 CEO Greg Noval — have been “fully settled.” Noval is now CEO of Canadian Superior.

As the dust begins to settle in the second coming of Ken Lay as CEO of Houston-based Enron Corp., Lay said the company will offer some employees new stock options at strike prices beginning this week, a one-time additional grant, which would be worth up to 5% of their salaries. He also said, however, that the trading giant will cut more than half of the 900 employees in its sagging broadband unit, moving 250 to other positions and offering severance packages to the other 250.

In a trading session that won’t soon be forgotten by bull norbear yesterday, natural gas futures marched easily higher as earlylong accumulation by funds morphed into a buying free-for-all whencommercials and locals entered the ring. After setting its dailylow during the first hour of trading at $5.80, it was up, up andaway for December, as it notched a new all-time commodity high at$6.025. The prompt month finished 31.8 cents higher on the day at$6.016. Meanwhile, soon to be spot month January was no slouch,gaining 29.6 cents to close at $6.002.

Texaco Inc. has agreed to pay $43 million to settle charges byseveral whistleblowers that the firm underpaid royalties due oncrude oil drilled from federal and Indian leases, The U.S. JusticeDepartment said Wednesday. The settlement covers underpayments fromJanuary 1980 to through December 1998. Two former AtlanticRichfield Co. marketing managers brought the lawsuit in the U.S.District Court in Lufkin, TX, and will receive part of the Texacosettlement. The settlement agreement was signed by representativesof several Indian tribes, as well as the federal government. Thegovernment has reached similar settlements on royalty underpaymentswith Mobil, Occidental Petroleum, Chevron, BP Amoco, Conoco, DevonEnergy, Union Pacific Resources and Sunoco.

Like a politician in an election year, the natural gas futuremarket had something for everyone yesterday as prices spiraledhigher early in the session on storm hype and short covering onlyto crumble at the end on slightly bearish storage numbers.

A group of natural gas producers has called on FERC to step in and settle once and for all the controversial issue of re-designing the capacity-allocation procedures of El Paso Natural Gas so that “firm” capacity on El Paso would really come to mean firm, and the practice of overbooking firm primary transportation capacity would become history at the pipeline’s SoCal/Topock delivery point into California.

A group of natural gas producers has called on FERC to step inand settle once and for all the controversial issue of re-designingthe capacity-allocation procedures of El Paso Natural Gas so that”firm” capacity on El Paso would really come to mean firm, and thepractice of overbooking firm primary transportation capacity wouldbecome history at the pipeline’s SoCal/Topock delivery point intoCalifornia.

In response to an unfavorable royalty decision by the ArkansasSupreme Court two weeks ago week, Southwestern Energy announcedplans sell its entire utility business to pay for the $109 millionjudgment against the company. As a direct result of the ruling,Southwestern also has suspended its quarterly dividend.

In response to an unfavorable royalty decision by the ArkansasSupreme Court last week, Southwestern Energy announced that it hasreceived the go-ahead from its board of directors to sell itsentire utility business to pay for the $109 million judgementagainst the company.. The state Supreme Court ruling upheld a 1998Sebastian County Circuit Court decision against the company.