Hope for the energy funds?
Well Julius, I don't know if the Natural Gas fund
is a lot different from the other energy funds, last
time I checked Enron was at the top of the list. If
I was really enthusiastic for natural gas I'd pick
some individual stocks--fsngx seems to be tracking
along with the rest of the market right now.
Anyway, as promised...
For those interested in La Nina and the hope that the
northern part of the US might be colder than the average
winter, here are the links to the Climate Prediction
Center. They certainly didn't go out on a limb however,
pretty dull stuff I'm afraid--I was hoping they'd canvas
the northern tier of the country with an excess 15%
probability of cold--that would actually be a pretty
dramatic forecast, but they did not do too much.
Main page (note that it may take a minute or two to load)
nic.fb4.noaa.gov
Discussion of the forecasts
nic.fb4.noaa.gov
Winter Outlook
nic.fb4.noaa.gov
You will note that the CPC has only assigned an excess
probability of 5% for colder then normal temperatures
for a a portion of North Dakota and Minnesota. That's a
pretty dull forecast, but they say
"THE SERIES OF LONG-LEAD FORECASTS FROM OND 98 THROUGH FMA
99 REFLECT THE HISTORICAL DISTRIBUTIONS OF SEASONAL MEAN
TEMPERATURES AND PRECIPITATION ASSOCIATED WITH PREVIOUS LA
NINAS. THE DEGREE OF CONFIDENCE IN THESE LA NINA-CONSISTENT
PREDICTIONS - BASED ON THE PAST PERFORMANCE OF THE ENSO SST
PREDICTIONS - IS GREATER THAN 90 PERCENT."
To that I say, so what? High confidence in a wishy washy
forecast. I'm sure their science is good, but who cares?
If La Nina is supposed to big such a big deal, the
forecast sure doesn't tell us much. Also, the forecast for
the east even shows a warm bias, cant be too happy
about that if you're a snow freak or an energy bug.
The forecast for Jan thru March has a larger area of cold
excess prob, so that is good tho.
Don't know what I'll do with the fund, still could work
out and be a very cold winter, but I sure wish the CPC had
been bolder. Maybe what you want is blocking in a year
with no El Nino or La Nina--but that is not forecastable.
Probably. High latitude blocking is like magic, it just
appears, persists, and suddenly an arctic high is on top
of you:-)
--MM |
