Trading

As expected, weekend prices took a steep plunge in Friday’strading as almost every point fell by around 20 cents or more. Thebiggest drops of almost 40 cents occurred at the SouthernCalifornia border and PG&E citygate, where both majordistributors had widely anticipated high-inventory OFOs in placefor Saturday.

Duke Energy Trading and Marketing and Dynegy Marketing and Tradewere the winning bidders in the first auction of Gulf Coast gastransportation services in the Minerals Management Service’s (MMS)Gulf of Mexico royalty in-kind pilot program. The two companieswill be transporting a total of 198 MMcf/d of royalty gasproduction to the General Services Administration (GSA) at marketpoints onshore Louisiana from December through March 2000.

Duke Energy Trading and Marketing and Dynegy Marketing and Tradewere the winning bidders in the first auction of Gulf Coast gastransportation services in the Minerals Management Service’s (MMS)Gulf royalty in-kind pilot program. The two companies will betransporting a total of 198 MMcf/d of royalty gas production to theGeneral Services Administration (GSA) onshore Louisiana fromDecember through March 2000.

Following the lead of an essentially flat screen during most ofthe cash trading period, the spot market leveled off Wednesday,with small upticks outweighing the few small declines. An Arcticcold front was moving eastward toward the Midwest and eventually tothe Northeast, making citygates tend to rise a bit more thanproduction-area points.

Taking a cue from Wednesday’s Access trading session, thefutures market probed lower yesterday as weak longs and speculatorstook profits away from the price rally earlier this week. TheNovember contract was dealt the largest blow, slipping 13.6 centsto finish at $2.834. December closely followed by tumbling 10.8cents to $3.051.

A power generation partnership formed last week by CinergyCapital & Trading and Duke Energy North America LLC (DENA)marks Cinergy’s first step toward mending the hole in its defensesagainst huge summer power demand peaks. The two companies areteaming up to build three gas-fired power plants with 1,400 MW ofgenerating capacity.

CMS Marketing, Services and Trading, (CMS-MST) has madesignificant additions to its energy services operations recently,signing a five-year energy management agreement with Chicago-basedBank One Corp. last week and expanding its national presencethrough the purchase of Viron Corp. from York International in lateSeptember.

After testing both the upside and the downside during the firsthour of trading, the futures market chose the middle road yesterdayas many traders waited on the sidelines ahead of the weekly storagereport. As a result, the November contract did not stray very farfrom center and finished the session up 1.5 cents at $2.601.

A power generation partnership formed yesterday by CinergyCapital & Trading and Duke Energy North America LLC (DENA)marks Cinergy’s first step toward mending the hole in its defensesagainst huge summer power demand peaks. The two companies areteaming up to build three gas-fired power plants with 1,400 MW ofgenerating capacity.