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Calpine CEO Cut Power Plans, Investors Not Reassured (Impact on California )
Bloomberg News ^ | 01/31 13:45 | Daniel Taub

Posted on 01/31/2002 4:15:06 PM PST by Ernest_at_the_Beach

Edited on 07/19/2004 2:09:36 PM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]

San Jose, California, Jan. 31 (Bloomberg) -- Calpine Corp. Chief Executive Officer Peter Cartwright has been unable to reassure investors about the power-plant builder's prospects after Enron Corp. collapsed and electricity prices declined.

Calpine stock is down 72 percent from a year ago, outpacing declines by rivals Mirant Corp. and Dynegy Inc. as investors soured on companies that buy and sell power. Enron, once the largest energy trader, filed the largest bankruptcy ever Dec. 2, and U.S. electricity demand has slowed with the economy.


(Excerpt) Read more at quote.bloomberg.com ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Extended News; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: calpowercrisis
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1 posted on 01/31/2002 4:15:07 PM PST by Ernest_at_the_Beach
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To: Calpowercrisis;randita;SierraWasp; Carry_Okie; okie01; socal_parrot; snopercod; quimby...
Calpowercrisis:
To find all articles tagged or indexed using Calpowercrisis, click below:
  click here >>> Calpowercrisis <<< click here  
(To view all FR Bump Lists, click here)



2 posted on 01/31/2002 4:16:21 PM PST by Ernest_at_the_Beach
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To: Ernest_at_the_Beach
El Paso Corp. plans to move $2 billion of debt onto its balance sheet after keeping it off using partnerships similar to those used by Enron.
3 posted on 01/31/2002 6:35:32 PM PST by ken21
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Comment #4 Removed by Moderator

To: nobodyUknow
dunno.

but i'll bet they're getting their accounting practices in order!

Williams, through its subsidiaries, connects businesses to energy, delivering innovative, reliable products and services. Based in Tulsa, Okla., Williams employs about 12,500 people worldwide. Other major offices are in Houston, Salt Lake City and Owensboro, Ky.

5 posted on 01/31/2002 6:42:24 PM PST by ken21
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To: ken21
I bet a lot of companies are going to stop using the dodge that Enron/Anderson thought was so cool!
6 posted on 01/31/2002 6:42:55 PM PST by Ernest_at_the_Beach
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Comment #7 Removed by Moderator

Comment #8 Removed by Moderator

Comment #9 Removed by Moderator

To: nobodyUknow
amazg!
10 posted on 01/31/2002 6:54:14 PM PST by ken21
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To: nobodyUknow
This is a choice statement:

Williams has been this heavily indebted before, said Carol Levenson, research director at Gimme Credit, a corporate-bond research service for institutional investors. "But if there's one thing we learned from Enron it's these things can snowball. Market nervousness can lead to counterparty nervousness, which can lead to rating agency nervousness and banker nervousness, and the company's financial flexibility could become impaired."

And is Gimme Credit

a real company?
LOL!!

....and the company's financial flexibility could become impaired."

Bankrupcty will do that to a company!

11 posted on 01/31/2002 6:56:31 PM PST by Ernest_at_the_Beach
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To: Ernest_at_the_Beach; Sierra Wasp
Thanks Ernest!

Just one question, Mr Cartwright:

Is Arthur Andersen your auditor and management consultant?

Hey, SW, not a bad decision on Grampa's part not to buy this stock last May!

Seriously, I hope that they pull out and all of their research and development capital was not spent on re electing Facist Davis!

12 posted on 01/31/2002 11:03:05 PM PST by Grampa Dave
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To: Grampa Dave
"Seriously, I hope that they pull out and all of their research and development capital was not spent on re electing Facist Davis!"

Seriously, the moment they started borrowing money with "zeros" (zero coupon bonds) to endear themselves within the membership of the Davis supporting Club Sierra, thinking they were going to crapitolize and corner the "magic market" on gas fired generation being the ONLY option left, NOT under attack by GANG-GREEN... is when they began to slide to hell on the path paved with "good intentions!" (yuk)

That new debt, when viewed in the light of ENDRON's phony baloney crumbling, is what's dooming them to perdition. Yep! You were a wise and prudent Grampa, Dave!!! (I must admit)

13 posted on 02/01/2002 5:22:02 AM PST by SierraWasp
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To: Ernest_at_the_Beach
I see Enron mentioned a couple of times in this article but it isn't clear how Enron is responsible for this. I'm sure that it will be made clear later. Enron is bound to be the cause of this, isn't it?
14 posted on 02/01/2002 5:28:16 AM PST by FreePaul
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To: SierraWasp
You are so right. Hopefully people will get the message - fascism junks your assets. Fascism doesn't pay.
15 posted on 02/01/2002 5:33:44 AM PST by no-s
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To: no-s
"You are so right."

Well, I should probably tell you that back in May, while the lights were flickering in Demonicrat beleagured CA and (CPN) was surging upward on the NYSE, I was irritating Grampa Dave about not having bought any shares of a company smart enough to pounce on problem induced by Davis and the Envirocrats, to which they clearly were poised with THE SOLUTION... Pipelines (not powerlines), Natural Gas Reserves (the only thing clean enough to burn in CA, supposedly) and their unique position of quickly building gas fired "peaker" power plants.

It looked at the time (to me) like they (CPN) were going to pull Davis' dumbass out of the fire, back into the frying pan. But no... Davis proceded to screw up his own wet dream by going after the powerlines, instead of the pipelines and blowing the surplus on LA Power and Waters gouging prices, while blaming Bush and ENDRON! What a laugh riot!!! (expensive one though)

16 posted on 02/01/2002 5:51:35 AM PST by SierraWasp
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To: SierraWasp
SW posted, "Seriously, the moment they started borrowing money with "zeros" (zero coupon bonds) to endear themselves within the membership of the Davis supporting Club Sierra, thinking they were going to crapitolize and corner the "magic market" on gas fired generation being the ONLY option left, NOT under attack by GANG-GREEN... is when they began to slide to hell on the path paved with "good intentions!" (yuk)

That new debt, when viewed in the light of ENDRON's phony baloney crumbling, is what's dooming them to perdition. Yep! You were a wise and prudent Grampa, Dave!!! (I must admit)"

Damn, for an old conservative goat er wasp, you have some good data here. I was not aware of these bonds. I hope that Club Sierra bought a slug of them for the retirement funds of their head enviral nazis and then invested their Rural cleansing funds in Calpine and Enron!

I wonder if Capine's auditor and management consultant is Arthur Andersen? (more on this below)

Actually my wise decision re not to buy Calpine was borrowed from a little younger but very wise friend who made a ton of money during the Clinton years and has done very well since then.

I ran into him the day before GW was sworn in. He told me to sell any stock of companies that were FOB's, Friends of Bill's. He mentioned Global Crossing, Loral, Oracle and Apple. His thesis was that any company that depended on the criminal Clintoon and Jake Reno to make a profit was in real peril the moment GW was sworn in. He was shorting a long list of FOB companies.

Flash forward to the end of Apr. beginning of May last year. Calpine was signing all of these contracts, their stock was shooting up like a rocket. I talked to my young friend. He said to beware of any company that was a FOG. FOG=Friend of Gray! He said the same priniciple re FOB's applied to FOG's. I said that Davis was still governor, and my friend said that made it even more dangerous for the FOG's. He view Davis as absolute Facist with zero intel re business.

This same friend's latest warning is get out any high flying stock during the past 5 years that uses Arthur Andersen as their auditor and consultant. Selling them short might be the way to make money in 2002! I will just stay away from FOG's and COAA's, clients of Arthur Andersen!

17 posted on 02/02/2002 5:13:38 AM PST by Grampa Dave
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To: Grampa Dave; SierraWasp
Well, although I am just an idealogue here, I must say Calpine's perfectly poised strategy seemed attractive to me too. I didn't bite tho, becaused "perfectly poised" in recent years has seemed to usually precede "burn the investor" for CA companies. I'm sure the FOG and COAA attributes are just as telling. Coupled to the other point is the absurdly artificial nature of the crisis, in that it was inflicted by the state government, and absurd reactions of Davis. I also worked for PG&E energy services before it was broken up and sold off, and I heard a lot of interesting stories there.

Another interesting fact about CA government seems to be the way all the money flows to southern california (particularly LA) governmental entities, e.g. most school funding heads to LA county. I was shocked at the tiny, tiny bite my city and county gets from property tax.

18 posted on 02/02/2002 6:15:47 AM PST by no-s
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To: no-s
We are on the same wave lenght. I really feel that Davis triggered this entire fiasco and planned on Goron being president.

That would have enabled him to bankrupt and put of business PG&E, gain control of Edison, gain control of the power transmission lines, enable LA Power to make a ton of money (which it did). Goron would have forced the other states to sell electricity and natural gas to Californian and take any financial hit that happened. Then Goron would have helped Davis seize control of whatever he wanted with the backing of the Federal Government.

When we got our November 2000, PG&E bill. I looked at it and saw that my electricity cost close to $300 and PG&E could only charge us less than $100. I knew that PG&E would be bankrupt in a few months. That rule in the phoney de regging bill where a company could not recoup what it paid for in electricity costs in its bills was a huge flag that something was really wrong. Who ever put that clause in the phoney deregging should be put in jail for life!

You probably were on to this before we discovered it.

Re the tax $'s going to So. Ca and LA. It is real simple. Illegal aliens and immigrant workers who vote DemonicRat don't pay much taxes if any. So Davis and his wh$res in the State legislature have to send our tax$'s south to pay for those votes re schools etc.

What county do you live in? Do you have something that you can post re which counties get more $'s than contributed? If so please post them.

Thanks for joining us and for your comments and insight.

19 posted on 02/02/2002 6:55:28 AM PST by Grampa Dave
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To: Grampa Dave
Well, theoretically I live in San Mateo but I'm working in Illinois (St. Louis area) right now - couldn't find a bay area job willing to match my unfortunate cashflow requirements. I'm not sure what's going to happen next in California, but I know we can count on Davis to screw anything good up. Looks very unstable. I've been having a dialogue with my wife about selling the house and moving to a state with no income tax and plenty of horses. Her theory is CA is hooked on boom-bust and it's worth it to stick it out. I'm not sure it's worth it to be working 2000 miles from home (3 weeks on, one week off).

The comment about the tax dollars was motivated by an city newsletter insert showing a couple of piecharts describing what property taxes pay for.

I'm interested in following up too, I will research it and post the results on FR.

20 posted on 02/02/2002 10:29:37 AM PST by no-s
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