Energy Legal Blog

Wending its way to FERC on exception (appeal) is Administrative Judge Carmen Cintron’s January 22 initial decision finding that lead natural gas trader for hedge fund Amaranth Advisors, Brian Hunter, manipulated the price of New York Mercantile Exchange (NYMEX) natural gas futures contracts in order increase earnings on futures look-alike contracts (primarily swaps) that Amaranth concurrently held on the largely unregulated exchanges, Intercontinental Exchange (ICE) and Clearport, or over-the-counter (OTC).  How FERC rules on legal issues on appeal should be instructive of how the agency will define market manipulation in both natural gas and electric power markets going forward. (more…)

PR News announced that Bracewell & Giuliani’s Energy Legal Blog will be recognized as the best “Legal PR Blog” at its annual Corporate Social Responsibility & Legal Awards Luncheon on February 24, 2010 at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. This award recognizes an outstanding and influential law-related weblog or online journal written by a representative of the organization with the goal of espousing the brand or a certain message and written with flair and personality.

“Managing a crisis and working with legal counsel are two areas of communication that will always be a part of a PR professional’s responsibilities,” notes Diane Schwartz, vice president of PR News. “The Legal PR Awards shines a light both on how law firms are communicating to their stakeholders and to how the PR industry is in the driver’s seat when a crisis hits.”

More information on the award program and this year’s winners is available at http://www.prnewsonline.com/awards/csr2009_event-finalists.html.

Invoking its authority under Section 4a(a) of the Commodity Exchange Act of 1936 (CEA), on January 14, 2010, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) in a 4-1 vote issued a proposed rule to establish speculative position limits for certain energy contracts traded on CFTC reporting markets.  The proposed rule would establish aggregate and exchange-specific position limits to economically similar contracts that are traded on the New York Mercantile Exchange (NYMEX) and Intercontinental Exchange (ICE).  Affected contracts and commodities include:  Henry Hub Natural Gas, Light Sweet Crude Oil (WTI), New York Harbor No. 2 Heating Oil, and New York Harbor Gasoline Blendstock (RBOB).  The CFTC proposes to exempt from the position limits bona fide hedging transactions and certain swap dealer risk management transactions.  Comments on the proposed rule are due 90 days after the rule’s publication in the Federal Register, likely in mid- to late April. (more…)