Spike

Consumers scream when their gas bills spike, and the typical utility response is to say that commodity costs are just a pass-through; the utility doesn’t make any money on the gas it delivers. True, but…

A screen spike of 36.6 cents a day earlier and ongoing heavy power generation load from high temperatures in the vicinity of 100 degrees across nearly all of the southern half of the U.S. trumped milder conditions in northern market areas and the usual decline of industrial load over a weekend in causing prices to keep rising at a sizable majority of points Friday.

For the longest time it seemed that natural gas prices hovered around $2-3 with a spike here and there. Now the range is $5-10. Oh, how times have changed. Speakers at GasMart 2007 in Chicago last week remembered the old days, briefly, while they advised attendees on how to deal with the new era of prices.

For the longest time it seemed that natural gas prices hovered around $2-3 with a spike here and there. Now the range is $5-10. Oh, how times have changed. Speakers at GasMart 2007 in Chicago Thursday remembered the old days, briefly, while they advised attendees on how to deal with the new era of prices.

A return of snow-bearing colder weather in the Rockies caused points there to spike by as much as $1.30 Monday and pushed some regional top-end prices above $6. Milder conditions elsewhere resulted in a mixed market that was mostly close to flat and in which losses moderately exceeded gains.

As expected, exceptional support from a prior-day 80.3-cent futures spike allowed the February cash aftermarket to get off to a strong start by rallying at most points Wednesday. The show of firmness got an extra boost from icy precipitation moving into much of the Southeast Thursday, adding to already existing cold-weather demand.

Buoyed by substantive heating load in many areas and the previous Friday’s futures spike of 42.4 cents, cash prices rebounded Monday from weekend weakness by rising at all points. Nearly all of the gains were strong in double digits; only Sumas and Westcoast Station 2 failed to go up by a dime or more.

Tulsa-based Williams net income for the third quarter was $106.2 million (18 cents/diluted share), more than 24 times the $4.4 million (1 cent/diluted share) net income of 3Q2005. The spike came from a 112% increase in natural gas liquids (NGL) sales margins, 22% higher gas production, and significantly reduced forward unrealized mark-to-market losses. These benefits were partially offset by higher operating and maintenance costs.

Tulsa-based Williams net income for the third quarter was $106.2 million (18 cents/diluted share), more than 24 times the $4.4 million (1 cent/diluted share) net income of 3Q2005. The spike came from a 112% increase in natural gas liquids (NGL) sales margins, 22% higher gas production, and significantly reduced forward unrealized mark-to-market losses. These benefits were partially offset by higher operating and maintenance costs.