Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Strategies & Market Trends : Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: mishedlo who wrote (17561)	12/3/2004 4:08:27 PM
From: ild	Respond to of 116555

Typographical Error Led to 22 Percent Spike in Natural-Gas Prices, El Paso Unit Says NEW YORK (AP) -- The cause of a 22 percent spike in natural-gas prices last week appears to have been a typographical error. Employees at ANR Pipeline Co., a unit of Houston-based El Paso Corp., said that they were the source of the error that was picked up by the Energy Information Administration in its Nov. 24 report. It was corrected Thursday. "It was just someone who put in a typo," said Sandy Myers of ANR Pipelines, a large operator of gas storage facilities. "It was just when someone was posting our storage number, and it had a big effect." The EIA's report, which coincided with the expiration of December options and came ahead of a long weekend when the market was heavily short, had an explosive effect on prices. Traders trying to roll over short positions were forced to buy at any price in the last two and a half hours of trading, incurring tens of millions of dollars in losses and spurring margin calls. The EIA's policy of only releasing revisions once a week kept the market guessing until Thursday morning if the report was an error or if it showed a bona fide rise in storage demand. Thursday's storage report carried a revision which seems to match an apparent typo still archived on ANR's publicly accessible bulletin board. EIA spokesman Jonathan Cogan confirmed that the reason for the revision was an erroneous submission. But he wouldn't give any more details, citing the agency's policy of confidentiality in order to encourage compliance in its various surveys of private companies. Although El Paso could have theoretically benefited from the error, analysts said that an intentional move by the company was almost out of the question. "We do not believe it was malicious. It was probably just an input error possibly by someone filling in over the Thanksgiving holidays," wrote Kyle Cooper, an energy analyst at Citigroup, in a Thursday afternoon report before ANR's involvement became clear. "That is little consolation to those who were short last week. Or to those who believed it and were long this week," he wrote.