Energy Risk
Growing up fast
Weather trading is seeing strong volume growth in the US, largely due to the influx of hedge funds into the market. Why such a big increase in interest, and what sort of strategies are the funds adopting? By Joe Marsh
Baiting the hook
End-users such as utilities and industrial companies are not showing the same keenness as hedge funds for trading weather derivatives, despite the efforts of banks, dealers and brokers to lure them in. By Joe Marsh
Regulation tops risk managers’ concerns
Regulatory risk is seen as the most significant threat to business and a greater source of concern than country risk, market and credit risk, terrorism and natural disasters, a recent survey reveals.
Louise Kitchen joins Deutsche
Louise Kitchen will join Deutsche Bank as managing director and global head of commodities structuring and marketing within its global markets division, the firm has announced.
BNP Paribas strengthens energy derivatives team
French bank BNP Paribas has strengthened its commodity derivatives team in New York, London and Singapore, particularly on the energy side.
Former Swiss Re weather experts launch hedge fund
Weather risk veterans Mark Tawney and Bill Windle, who left global reinsurer Swiss Re on July 7, are starting a hedge fund, named Takara, Energy Risk has learned. Weather trader Bill MacLauchlan departed Swiss Re at the same time, for personal reasons.
Nymex, Icap to launch gas, crude oil daily settlement derivatives
The New York Mercantile Exchange (Nymex) and inter-dealer broker Icap are to launch an electronic market in same-day over-the-counter (OTC) options on prompt-month settlement prices for crude oil and natural gas. Starting on Monday (July 18), the…
In pole position
Technology
Keep it simple, stupid
Do you prefer sophistication or simplicity? Neil Palmer takes a look at optimisation methods in energy modelling and asks if energy quants aren’t sometimes being a little too heavy-handed
Francois-Xavier Saint Macary
It can’t be easy hauling a whole commodities division overseas, but SG CIB veteran Francois-Xavier Saint Macary has big ambitions. By Oliver Holtaway
Belgian power exchange to launch early 2006
The Belgian day-ahead electricity market is due to start in early 2006 on the Belgian power exchange (Belpex) in a link-up with Dutch power exchange APX and French energy exchange Powernext. This is the first time three power exchanges will be linked…
Some brokers taking wrong approach to freight, says senior broker
Inter-dealer brokers could be taking the wrong approach by entering the freight derivatives market through joint ventures with physical shipping brokers rather than directly broking physical freight, says a senior energy broker.
Struggling for growth
All three Canadian energy exchanges – NGX, Watt-Ex and NetThruPut – are finding it slow-going with their expansion plans. Meanwhile the rivalry between NGX and Watt-Ex is growing. Joe Marsh reports
Storage strategies
Companies are increasingly realising they can use natural gas storage to add value to their bottom line. TransCanada’s Farzan Nathoo weighs up the strategies available for optimising value through storage
Training the tiger
Derivatives are finally beginning to gain wider acceptance in Taiwan, but senior executives remain wary, associating them with the collapse of Barings and, more recently, China Aviation Oil’s huge trading losses, finds David Hayes
A calculated gamble
After a promising start, Canadian carbon trading has slowed. The country has much work to do if it wants to get a domestic greenhouse-gas trading market running ahead of the 2008 Kyoto deadline. By Catherine Lacoursiere
The best of all worlds
Thanks to their varying scale, structure and diversity, European organisations often have very different solutions to risk management. But which system is the most effective? In an exclusive to Energy Risk, the European Energy Risk Forum offers a route…
Emissions education
As the European carbon market continues to grow, so too do some unique challenges: not least the gap between retail and wholesale players and the problem of counterparty credit risk. Oliver Holtaway reports
Editor
"With oil prices at record highs, energy is set to remain key in strategic decision making"
Trusts gain traction
Canadian oil and gas companies are rushing to convert to royalty trusts, despite the stigma some attach to them. This is good news for the energy-hedging market, but some still have reservations about the trust sector. By Joe Marsh
A good time to build
US utilities may need to spend more than $100 billion in the next 25 years on new power plants and transmission capacity. Richard McMahon looks at how utilities are assessing long-term risks and attracting potential investors
Banking on tankers
Logical Information Machines’ Sandy Fielden provides an analyst’s perspective of new opportunities for freight risk management with a specific focus on the crude (dirty) tanker trade from the Caribbean to the US Gulf
Risk-adjusted planning
An energy firm’s economic performance can be highly affected by incorrect valuation of implied economic risk. For this reason it is essential to provide management with the correct risk assessment tools. Here we propose a way of introducing risk…