Shove

Push has come to shove for Pogo Producing Co., which Thursday announced it has begun exploring strategic alternatives to sell or find a merger partner for all or part of its assets.

Already riding the crest of a wave of heating load to higher prices, the cash market used an extra shove from Monday’s 36.6-cent screen spike to record even bigger gains in most cases Tuesday than it started the week with.

If push comes to shove, CenterPoint Energy Inc. said it is ready to go all the way up to the Texas Supreme Court in challenging a Public Utilities Commission of Texas (PUCT) decision that the company will only be allowed to recover $2.3 billion of the $4.25 billion it requested in stranded costs and interest in the final adjustment or “true-up” of costs associated with the transition to retail competition.