Risk Staff
Follow Risk
Articles by Risk Staff
Banking on energy
Banks keen to establish an energy trading presence are finding that partneringwith energy companies, or even acquiring trading businesses outright, could bethe way forward. Paul Lyon reports
Weather patterns
OTC weather derivatives volumes are down around 20% on last year, but exchange-tradedweather futures are on the up. Paul Lyon looks at WRMA’s annual survey,and reviews the past year’s trends in the weather risk market
Seb Walhain
Fortis Bank’s Seb Walhain is surprised that more financial institutionsaren’t involved in the European emissions trading scheme. By Paul Lyon
Energising Houston
Bear Stearns created its Houston-based energy group to acquire and optimise powergeneration assets in North America. And the business is going from strength-to-strength,says its managing director Pamela Baden. Paul Lyon report
Getting physical
Abstract: Asset-backed trading strategies usually employ a combination of physicalpositions, which are subject to physical risk; and financial hedging intruments,which are not. Here, Steve Leppard shows how value-at-risk, applied to this combinedrisk…
The standard is set
Continuing last month’s focus on documentation under which commoditiesare traded on the UK’s National Balancing Point and Belgium’s ZeebruggeHub, using Isda’s European Gas Annex. By Agnes Bizet and Kevin Wulwik
Energising Houston
Bear Stearns created its Houston-based energy group to acquire and optimise powergeneration assets in North America. And the business is going from strength tostrength, says its managing director Pamela Baden. PaulLyon reports
Dealing in doubt
Scepticism still surrounds the EU’s National Allocation Plans for theEuropean Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) starting in January 2005. IvanO’Toole discusses the cost implications of the Kyoto Protocol for the EU power industryand anticipates a few…
Nordic volumes heading south
Nordic region electricity trading volumes are falling fast, which is damagingprofits at Oslo-based power exchange Nord Pool. The company may face postinga loss for 2004 if it cannot reverse this trend. Joe Marsh reports
Faith in the figures
There are signs that price reporting will remain voluntary, despite the drop-offin reporting levels, but proposals are still being made on all sides. EricFishhaut looks at the progress being made to achieve greater price transparency
Energy Risk launches weather derivatives survey
Energy Risk , the leading publication for energy trading and finance professionals, today launched its first annual weather derivatives survey.
Montréal Exchange and Oxen to offer energy clearing
The Canadian Derivatives Clearing Corporation (CDCC) - a wholly owned subsidiary of the Montréal Exchange (MX) - and the Alberta Watt Exchange, an Alberta-based energy exchange wholly owned by digital commodity exchange operator Oxen, are to provide…
El Paso sells four power plants
Houston-based energy company El Paso Corp is continuing its mass sell-off of assets by closing the sale of a further four power plants to Northern Star Generation. El Paso Merchant Energy, a business unit of El Paso Corp, sold the facilities on July 2…
Bucking the trend
Openlink’s founder Coleman Fung talks to James Ockenden about the decisionsthat have promoted his company to one of the leading risk management solutionproviders
Simulating Excellence
Of the numerous risk management problems that can be solved with a computer,there are few that cannot be solved using Microsoft Excel. BrettHumphreys discusseshow it can be used to construct Monte Carlo simulations
The troubleshooter
After struggling for a year with a difficult Triple Point installation, US energycompany Cinergy brought in energy IT veteran Joel McKnight. Nine months on, implementationand integration is complete. By Joe Marsh
Technology upload
There has been a recent upswing in the fortunes of energy risk software industry. And that is reflected in this year’s expanded technology vendor guide, making it the definitive guide to energy software and technology available
EC fails emissions scheme, says E&Y director
The European Commission’s failure to challenge eight EU national allocation plans undermines Europe’s ability to meet its carbon dioxide emissions reduction targets agreed under the Kyoto Protocol according to Ernst & Young’s director of emissions…
Ken Gustafson
Shell Trading is enjoying the influx of new energy market players. JamesOckenden talks to Ken Gustafson , head of its deal structuring unit in Houston
Spring loading
Abstract: In May’s Expert Series, LesClewlow and Chris Strickland discussedthe use of Monte Carlo simulation in energy risk management and introduced aseries of models that they argued were suitable for the simulation of energy-and weather-dependent…
Managing manipulation
Sharon Brown-Hruska, commissioner of the Washington, DC-based Commodity FuturesTrading Commission, talks to Paul Lyon about the need for sensible, rather thanover-bearing, energy derivatives regulation
Long wait to market
Plans to create a small natural gas exchange in Russia highlight the complicationsof gas sector reform – arriving at realistic tariffs, finding new reservesand organising transport to name a few. Maria Kielmas reports