Frugal utilities rise to the top, but anticipate cap-ex turnaround.

America’s power and gas companies cut capital spending in 2009 by more than 10 percent compared to 2008, according a report published in the September issue of Public Utilities Fortnightly magazine (www.fortnightly.com). However, as regulatory and economic uncertainties diminish during 2010 and 2011, many companies are resuming major construction programs that were delayed during the recession.

The sixth-annual Fortnightly 40 study, sponsored by Accenture, ranked the four-year shareholder value performance of U.S. investor-owned utilities (IOUs) and merchant power companies. The C Three Group of Atlanta, which along with Public Utilities Fortnightly developed the F40 financial model, analyzed the annual reports of 84 power and gas companies to compare a series of shareholder-value metrics — such as profit margin, dividend yield, return on equity (ROE), return on assets (ROA) and sustainable growth.

Among the F40 study’s results, the report showed that cumulative capital expenditures among all 84 companies in the survey declined by nearly $10 billion from 2008 to 2009, with a corresponding improvement in free cash flow. As a whole the industry’s cap-ex totaled $83.9 billion in 2009, versus the previous year’s expenditure of $93.8 billion. Accordingly, the average F40-ranked company in 2009 generated $300 million in free cash, compared to negative-$100 million in 2008.

Despite the industry’s cap-ex retrenchment through 2009, rebounding electricity sales and a stabilizing economic outlook subsequently have allowed some companies to expedite projects that previously were deferred, according to Jean Reaves Rollins, managing partner with the C Three Group. “Well over 10,000 MW of new generating capacity has been announced or placed in the licensing process in the past 12 months,” she said. “We expect to see more announcements as the implications of clean air standards become clearer.”

Moody’s senior vice president James Hempstead echoed the observation. “Many big companies are actively revising their views and strategic assessments as to how much capacity will be refurbished, repowered or mothballed,” he said. “There could be a significant amount of capital expense on the sidelines that hasn’t been incorporated into plans yet.”

F40-ranked Dominion Resources (#9) provides a clear example; CFO Mark McGettrick told Fortnightly the company purchases more wholesale electricity than almost every other utility in America, but nonetheless the company is proceeding cautiously with construction plans. “We have a lot of catching up to do on the generation side,” McGettrick said. “We have a construction plan through 2012 … but environmental regulations are a moving target, particularly regarding CO2 emissions.” He said Dominion is “taking a wait-and-see approach” toward investments affected by potential changes in federal environmental and energy policies.

“The industry is in a holding pattern, but the end is in sight,” said Michael T. Burr, Public Utilities Fortnightly’s editor-in-chief and author of the F40 report. “Companies are waiting to see what happens with the economy and with shale-gas developments. They’re waiting on the outcome of elections in November, and they’re waiting for energy policy leadership from Washington. Once we get clarity on those issues, we’ll know whether the Big Build is returning.”

The 2010 Fortnightly 40 Ranking

Companies leading the F40 ranking in 2010 included DPL, Exelon and Energen. Ranked among the top 10 companies for the first time was Mirant (#4) — which recently agreed to be acquired by RRI Energy. And NRG Energy jumped into the 11^th position after appearing in the top 40 rankings (#32) for the first time last year. Such shifts exemplify an ongoing trend among the F40 ranks, with growth-oriented unregulated businesses driving stronger long-term shareholder performance. For the past four years, the top 10 companies in the F40 have earned an increasing share of their revenues from unregulated resources, compared with a decreasing share among the bottom 10 ranked companies.

In other trends, Southern Company and Edison International — both of which increased their cap-ex budgets substantially in 2009 and produced negative cash flow at least two years in a row — dropped to the bottom half of the F40, after previously holding strong positions in the top 15. And volatility in natural gas prices sent rankings downward for some gas utilities, including Delta Natural Gas, Equitable Resources and New Jersey Resources.

In general, however, the F40 metrics — combined with supplementary 2009 and 2010 data from the C Three Group, Accenture, Moody’s and the Edison Electric Institute — showed that F40 ranked companies remain financially robust despite some adverse results in 2009. For example:

• Slumping electricity sales drove ROA figures for the F40 companies downward by about one-fifth last year, from an average of about 6 percent in 2008 to 4.75 percent in 2009;
• Stock prices for the F40 companies have underperformed the broader market since January 2009 — although they outperformed the Dow Jones Utilities Index by nearly 10 percent;
• F40 companies outperformed all other categories of power and gas companies in most measures of credit quality, including debt-coverage ratios; and
• Except for a few companies that face substantial regulatory risk, credit ratings have held steady for most companies in the F40 rankings.

“There’s no homogeneous answer to what drives long-term performance,” said Robert Laurens, senior executive in Accenture’s strategy practice. “The most successful companies are those that execute a strategy that’s consistent with the company’s core competencies and its market context — whether it’s a regulated or non-regulated business.”

Fortnightly 40 RankingsFull Financial Data, Historic Trends and Supplemental Analysis from the C-Three Group LLC, Accenture and Moody’s available in the FULL REPORT. Not a subscriber? Click FREE TRIAL to gain immediate access.

Company	2010 F40 Rank
DPL	1
Exelon	2
Energen	3
Mirant	4
PPL	5
National Fuel Gas	6
Public Service Enterprise Group	7
Entergy	8
Dominion Resources	9
Gas Natural (Energy West)	10
NRG	11
Questar	12
FirstEnergy	13
AGL Resources	14
Allegheny Energy	15
Sempra Energy	16
New Jersey Resources	17*
TECO Energy	17*
South Jersey Industries	19
NStar	20
EQT	21
OGE Energy	22
Centerpoint Energy	23
El Paso Electric	24*
Nicor	24*
Constellation Energy	26
MGE Energy	27
Southern Company	28
UGI	29*
FPL Group	29*
DTE Energy	31
Edison International	32
Northwest Natural Gas	33
Piedmont Natural Gas	34
AES	35*
Alliant	35*
Allete (Minnesota Power)	37
Delta Natural Gas	38*
Southern Union	38*
RGC Resources	40*
WGL Holdings	40*

* Indicates statistical tie among category ranks. Because the 40th position was a tie, the 2010 Fortnightly 40 includes 41 companies.

Copyright 2010, PUR Inc., Vienna, VA, All Rights Reserved.

Permission to cite the F40 table in whole or in part is granted to publications that acknowledge the source as follows: Public Utilities Fortnightly magazine, September 2010 (www.fortnightly.com). Sponsored by Accenture, with methodology and analysis provided by the C Three Group.

Posted: September 2nd, 2010 under Current News, Uncategorized, credit crunch, credit ratings, energy policy, finance, recession, regulation, utility stocks.
Comments: none

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Sept. 1, 2009

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Contact:
Michael Burr
burr@pur.com
320-632-5342
Public Utilities Reports Inc.

 

Fortnightly 40 Survey: Utility Balance Sheets Strained by Growing Expenses, Declining Sales

 Cost pressures portend contentious rate cases.

Vienna, Va.: Share values among America’s utility, gas and power companies have outperformed the broader market since the financial crisis began one year ago. Maintaining this performance, however, might become more difficult in the months ahead, according to a report published in the September issue of Public Utilities Fortnightly magazine (www.fortnightly.com).

The fifth-annual Fortnightly 40 study, sponsored by Accenture, ranked the four-year shareholder value performance of U.S. investor-owned utilities (IOUs) and other companies active in electric power and gas industries. The C Three Group of Atlanta, which along with Public Utilities Fortnightly developed the F40 financial model, analyzed the annual reports of 85 companies to compare a series of shareholder-value metrics — such as profit margin, dividend yield, return on equity (ROE), return on assets (ROA) and sustainable growth.

Companies leading the F40 ranking this year included DPL, Energen and PPL. Ranked among the top 40 for the first time was NRG (32), and returning to the ranking after a year’s absence were Mirant (21) and AES (37) — three companies with heavy exposure in wholesale power markets. Conversely, Alliant and Northwest Natural Gas slipped to the bottom of the F40 after ranking in the high 20s last year.

The F40 metrics — combined with supplementary 2009 data — showed the industry remains financially robust despite a substantial decline in stock prices. Cap-ex spending among the Fortnightly 40 companies grew by nearly 30 percent in 2008, topping $49 billion, and the entire industry’s cap-ex increased 17 percent to nearly $94 billion. At the same time, equity returns among the top 40 companies declined only slightly, from 15.4 percent in FY2007 to 14.6 percent in 2008.

Notwithstanding these strong figures, economic forces are putting pressure on balance sheets. Kilowatt-hour deliveries have declined rapidly in many parts of the country — with residential consumption falling by as much as 8 percent in the second quarter of 2009, and industrial sales dropping at double-digit rates. These trends, combined with the costs of ongoing cap-ex programs, pushed the industry’s total net cash flow deeper into negative territory, from -$10.2 billion in FY2007 to -$19 billion in FY2008. Yet, despite this decline in free cash, utilities have continued growing their dividend payouts — albeit at a slower pace in the first half of 2009.

To protect dividends, companies are delaying spending projects and tightening operating budgets. “We’ve consolidated spending decisions among our plants,” said Paul Barbas, CEO of number-one ranked DPL Inc., parent of Dayton Power & Light in Ohio. “We have an engineering team for our entire business that stacks up investments on a fleet-wide basis.”

Additionally, some utilities have cut their payroll, and a few have been forced to slash dividends — a move applauded by rating agencies but abhorred by shareholders. The Fortnightly 40 study concludes that future financial performance — including the sector’s generous dividends — will depend as much on regulatory relationships as it does financial management.

“Utilities need regulators to make them whole for lost revenues, and also to finance the industry’s transition to a greener operating model,” said Michael T. Burr, Fortnightly’s editor-in-chief and the F40 study’s author. “The result will be rising rates — an unpopular move in any economy, and a political nightmare during a recession. Continued strong performance will depend on balancing customers’ need for clean and affordable energy supplies against utilities’ need for low-cost capital.”

The 2009 Fortnightly 40 Ranking
Copyright 2009, PUR Inc., Vienna, VA, All Rights Reserved. Permission to cite the F40 table in whole or in part is granted to publications that acknowledge the source as follows:

Public Utilities Fortnightly magazine, September 2009 (www.fortnightly.com). Sponsored by Accenture, with methodology and analysis provided by the C Three Group.

1  DPL
2  Energen
3  PPL
4  National Fuel Gas
5  Exelon
6  FirstEnergy
7  Entergy
8  New Jersey Resources
9  Southern Company
10  Questar
11* CLECO
11* Equitable Resources
13  Edison International
14* MDU Resources
14* TECO Energy
16  Dominion Resources
17  Public Service Enterprise Group
18* Allegheny Energy
18* Sempra Energy
20  AGL Resources
21  Mirant
22  Nicor
23  OGE Energy
24  UGI
25  NStar
26  South Jersey Industries
27  Delta Natural Gas
28  Centerpoint Energy
29* DTE Energy
29* PG&E
31  El Paso Electric
32* NRG
32* SCANA
34  WGL Holdings
35  MGE Energy
36  Vectren
37  AES
38  Northwest Natural Gas
39* Alliant
39* Ameren

* Indicates statistical tie among category ranks. Because the 39th position was a tie, the 2009 Fortnightly 40 contains no 40th rank.

PUBLIC UTILITIES FORTNIGHTLY (www.fortnightly.com), published by Public Utilities Reports Inc., in Vienna, Va., is the journal of record for the U.S. utility industry, providing authoritative, in-depth analysis of trends in generation, transmission and distribution of electricity and natural gas. For more than 70 years, Public Utilities Fortnightly has delivered exclusive interviews and expert analysis to help utility-industry executives and regulators decide where to invest, how the industry will be regulated and what the future holds. Subscription Rate: $169/year.

Posted: September 2nd, 2009 under Current News, Uncategorized, credit crunch, investment banks, recession, utility stocks.
Comments: 1

Editor’s Note: Fortnightly interviewed Constellation Energy CEO Mayo Shattuck this summer. His comments were included in Fortnightly’s June Frontlines column. The complete transcript of the interview follows, as part of an ongoing series of conversations about managing during a time of fundamental change.

 

FORTNIGHTLY: How does the changing U.S. utility landscape affect Constellation’s strategic direction? How have changing markets and government policies factored into Constellation’s decision to sell trading businesses and generating assets?
SHATTUCK: A few macro trends are important to our strategy. The first, clearly, is that when the credit markets vaporized, certain businesses that we were in couldn’t be supported by the credit environment. It’s important for us to be an investment-grade company—particularly for a couple of the businesses we’re in, and less for another. Most utilities feel they should have an investment-grade rating because it leads to a lower cost of capital. Most state regulators would agree.

On the marketing side, marketing activity requires a daily posting of collateral. These numbers can move significantly with volatility in commodity prices. The change in the credit markets of last year and this year make it more difficult to support a commodities trading operation. To the extent you are focusing on marrying these two together, you’ll make sure you yield to an investment-grade company. But if you can’t make it in the market, you have to redirect your positions.

We took our non-core positions in commodity trading and gas trading and reduced the collateral associated with those by divesting them. That’s allowed us to get quickly to a place where we have three core businesses, and we have an investment-grade company and can march forward with a narrower scope—namely Baltimore Gas & Electric, our generation fleet, and our large-customer supply business, selling electricity and gas to large commercial and industrial customers. That’s the one that needs a significant amount of working capital, and therefore requires us to be investment grade and still have access to credit markets to support it. We’ve significantly reduced our exposure to trading operations.

The one business that doesn’t necessarily need to be investment-grade on its own is the merchant generation business. We are a merchant generator, but we’ve managed the balance sheet so we’re retaining an investment-grade rating.

The business of trading commodities and the depth of counterparties has changed. That’s another reason to pull back on exposures and markets. The liquidity and depth of these markets has changed. As a consequence, people participating in these markets have to reduce their exposure, or they could find themselves too big in some of these markets.

 

FORTNIGHTLY: How are you managing the regulatory changes happening in your service territory?

SHATTUCK: In Maryland, the issue that continues to be topical here is whether the deregulation of 1999 is working or not. We’ve been an advocate of competitive markets for some time, and are at the point of seeing the effect of falling prices on rates. That’s true in Maryland and Pennsylvania. Just at this moment the markets are beginning to respond to recessionary forces and also to other elements of competitive markets. We’re beginning to see falling prices, and the auctions taking place in PJM are yielding lower prices. So the debate about whether to re-regulate comes at an auspicious time, given how markets evolve under pure competitive forces. We’d like to see that continue, and see it across the United States.

Having said that, there is a certain degree of angst on the part of regulators and legislators about just how much time it takes for this whole process of deregulation to work. So there are advocates out there for certain kinds of re-regulation, developing a hybrid market. We have to engage in those discussions and consider whether there are certain elements of deregulation aren’t working well. That has been topical here in Maryland for a couple of years. We’ve been very willing to engage in that debate, even though we are advocates of competitive markets and are at the point where we should look to see what effects competition is having on rates in deregulated markets.

FORTNIGHTLY: As Constellation strengthens its alliance with EdF, how will the company be better positioned for success in the U.S. energy industry?

SHATTUCK: One of the reasons for the strategic alignment with EdF is to build up capacity for development of new nuclear. We’ve had a very effective partnership for three or three and a half years, and we keep pushing the ball down the road. They have an interest in having a greater footprint in the United States, so they have greater visibility to the markets, and understand where best to deploy their capital and their investment in UniStar with us.

We’re very pleased by this outcome, where they’ll own half of the existing nuclear fleet. It gives us a chance to have a significant partner to look for a variety of ways to ensure we can participate on the new nuclear side. All of us are respectively pretty small in the scheme of things to be building plants that can cost $10 to 13 billion. We have to think creatively about the alliances we need in order to do that—not just money, but skill and perseverance and links to other strategic partners.

We have a model that we believe allows us to participate in what we believe is an imperative to build a new nuclear capacity in the United States. We will stay in the game and lead the charge. We’ve been at it for four years. The DOE loan-guarantee program is going well, and we’re excited to be part of that process. Obviously we face challenges going forward, but we’re an example of a company that would be building a merchant plant and it will be exciting to see new nuclear happen as a merchant project.

 

FORTNIGHTLY: How does the trend toward green energy, conservation and distributed resources affect Constellation’s business plan?

SHATTUCK: We advocate for a realistic mix in generating capacity. This recent investment in the last 10 years in renewables has been fantastic, but we need to focus on the capacity of the grid to absorb and manage these intermittent resources. The model requires a balanced mix of all resources. Our attention to base load in the future is an equal imperative. We can’t lose sight of base load requirements.

It’s no surprise to anyone we have a balance of nuclear and fossil assets. We’ve tried to move the ball on efficiency and demand reduction and conservation. We have some innovative things happening in Maryland. We’re an advanced state, in the sense we’re already decoupled. We have incentives to help people reduce consumption—our Peak Rewards program. We’re moving down a path of the modern utility, where people are going to help the evolution of the grid by virtue of understanding their own use. We have the early starts of an AMI project, and we’re working on the early stages of things like smart grid and hybrid vehicles. All these things will make a huge difference in the long term, and every utility has to be looking at these things. I believe we are marching down a very progressive path on that front, and our state regulators are cooperative and interested in doing so.

On the competitive side of the house, where we’re selling power and services to large C&I customers, that business has grown to be quite large. We’re not only selling power and gas to these customers now, but offering other services associated with their participation in renewables. We’re installing solar panels, putting in distributed generation. That whole movement will be an important part of the future as companies like ours educate large C&I customers in how they can manage their energy use.

It’s part of our long-term business plan, balanced with strong low-cost base load power. That’s why we’re as involved as we are in the nuclear movement. But there is tremendous interest among customers in distributed generation, particularly for applications like peak-shaving, and improving their own environmental footprint. There are a lot of angles of attack that will drive distributed generation to play a more meaningful role, and hopefully that’s where technology and innovation also will play a significant role. My hope is that innovation leads to methods where we have much more capacity in much smaller sizes, hopefully in renewables technologies that will help society.

 

FORTNIGHTLY: From a management perspective, how are you managing the changes Constellation is going through? What are the most important issues that demand your attention, and how are you dealing with them?

SHATTUCK: The events of the last year clearly have been a distraction, but the operating units are doing just fine. There’s no reason for the operating units to be distracted. It’s the requirement of management to make sure they’re steadily focused on safety, reliability and their basic operations from a day-to-day basis. I think we’ve come through the stormy capital market period very well in that respect.

The areas of the company most affected were those being downsized as a result of the credit markets. The businesses themselves actually were doing reasonably well. It was the credit underpinning supporting them that dissolved. The difficulty is explaining to people that have performed well why they have a reduced amount of capital allocated to them, and they’ll have to go through a downsizing of employees.

As a result of the businesses we divested, most of those people ended up at Goldman Sachs, Macquarie Cook and EdF. Most of these people just transplanted themselves to their new owners, and that allowed us to devote capital to our new objectives. That was understood, and people felt good about how they were treated, but no question the specter of the credit and capital markets collapsing at the end of last year made everyone nervous. We had to change a lot of senior managers and put in place people that wanted to look out 10 to 20 years as opposed to thinking about what hedge fund they wanted to join. That all went very well. We made some management changes at the right time.

We’ve gone through the vast majority of the transition. In our last earnings call, we talked about a de-risking process, including divestiture. We’ll be proving ourselves in the next year as we downsize our participation in commodities markets.

 

FORTNIGHTLY: What aspects of the commodities business are you keeping?

SHATTUCK: We have a central service area to deal with the hedging requirements on the generation side and the customer supply business. We sell power around the country in places where we have no generation. That requires a sophisticated backbone of risk management. We have supporting operations for hedging of our generation fleet as well as megawatt hours that we sell to C&I customers. That’s the primary purpose of the operation now. It’s managing the remnants of what we now call the portfolio optimization book, which is really just the gradual reduction and elimination of the old commodities trading book. The market understands that.

 

FORTNIGHTLY: What have you learned from this transition at Constellation? What advice would you offer to a utility company CEO who is facing a similar set of challenges?

SHATTUCK: There were a lot of lessons learned in all of this. One of the main lessons is associated with the quality of our earnings mix. We tried to build a business based on this evolution of the competitive markets in the United States and internationally. At the end of the day, we weren’t successful at convincing people about the quality of earnings that fall into a bucket of trading earnings. They weren’t valued in the market place, so the additional risk associated with lower quality earnings wasn’t worth it. When the credit crisis came that problem got exacerbated, and we made the decision to move rapidly out of that.

The interesting lesson I find for myself and that may be applied to some others is that the utility industry does generate very high quality earnings. Whether from distribution, transmission or generation, they are high quality because they are repeatable, more annuity-like. To the extent you degrade your model with a lower quality earnings base, you potentially aren’t adding as much shareholder value as you might hope.

 

FORTNIGHTLY: The merchant power business carries some of the same kinds of risks, doesn’t it? How does that affect the quality of earnings?

SHATTUCK: On generation side it will be more cyclical, and of somewhat lesser quality, but still of high quality. It’s the trading revenues specifically that cast some doubt as to whether you’re really going to be rewarded for good performance. Trading earnings probably belong on bank balance sheets, and even they struggle a bit with how much value they get from trading revenue.

There are aspects of the marketing business, of which trading support is one, that can get a good value. A sales and marketing arm, as an example, where we’re providing risk management services to large customers, is shown to have high repeatability, high retention rates and good margins. That kind of business should be rewarded with a decent multiple.

All of our companies need access to the capital markets. We all borrow, but there are some aspects of the business that are really dependent on it. All utilities are dependent on access. The generation companies, obviously, to build these big projects must have access to capital markets. Those are the priorities when it comes to reliability of our system. We have to put capital there. In areas that we consider on the margin I think that great care has to be given to the quality of those earnings, so you’re really aiming toward achieving the highest shareholder value you can, and not putting a higher risk-reward expectation on lower-quality earnings that eventually could come back and hurt you.-Michael T. Burr

Posted: July 28th, 2009 under Uncategorized, credit crunch, nuclear renaissance, recession, regulation, renewables, utility stocks.
Comments: none

-Mark T. Williams, Boston University Finance & Economics Department

For several decades, the top four U.S. independent investment banks—Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, Merrill Lynch and Lehman Brothers—have been instrumental to the growth of America’s power and gas utility industry. With the sudden shotgun marriage of Merrill Lynch, the bankruptcy of Lehman, and the transformation of Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley into bank holding companies, the investment banks are now history.

Additionally, Wall Street investment banking has been consolidated rapidly with “the Big Three” commercial banks—Barclays PLC, Bank of America and J.P. Morgan—taking advantage of bottom-feeding opportunities.

This dramatic reshaping of Wall Street has come too swiftly to fully comprehend, yet it will have an immediate and lasting impact on the utility sector.

With immediate job losses among investment bankers, a decline in their ranks will reduce competition for underwriting utility bond deals. Less competition will equate to higher fees. This might not be immediately visible in a weak economy, but it will show up as the economy eventually rebounds.

Significant investment banking consolidation and downsizing will result in a loss of institutional knowledge as older experienced investment bankers are forced to take severances.

Having a banker who knows the history of the utility, and the company’s management and its level of corporate risk-taking, can be invaluable when structuring and underwriting bonds, as well as providing M&A guidance. Utilities will need to begin building new relationships.

The recent market crisis, including the bankruptcy of Lehman, has resulted in significant market uncertainty. The proposed $700 billion Treasury Department bailout has raised additional concerns about how such a plan will be funded. Such events have placed increased pressure on interest rates, raising the cost of both short-term and long-term capital. In addition, as more of the investment banking business falls in the hands of fewer commercial banks, it remains uncertain whether utilities can count on the same level of service they enjoyed previously. The corporate cultures of investment and commercial banking can be quite different, and Wall Street’s reshaping might result in customers losing out.

Prior to the weekend shotgun wedding with Merrill Lynch, Bank of America CEO Kenneth Lewis was less than enthusiastic about how investment banking activities might fit inside his institution. Moreover, it’s unclear whether these banks will view serving the gas and power utility industry as a strategic priority. For example, although Barclays is buying Lehman’s defunct investment bank, the European bank reportedly hasn’t decided which divisions it would keep and build a franchise around.

In the weeks and months ahead, one trend to watch closely is whether the investment bankers who are able to find new homes will be randomly scattered around Wall Street, or whether the Big Three banks will make it a priority to keep these utility teams intact.

Now that the Big Three hold more of the cards, they should reach out to the utility industry and pronounce their intentions. What will be their level of commitment? Will they devote the capital needed to adequately service this industry? We might be in a recession, but the market will recover eventually, and the utility industry will continue to grow and prosper. Having a knowledgeable investment banker ready, able and willing to underwrite or structure a merger will be crucial.

So the message to Barclays, Bank of America and the other institutions that may be the future home to our power and utility industry investment bankers: Whatever you do, be good to them, as they are an endangered species, and vital to this industry’s future.

Editor’s note: Williams previously was a senior vice president of Citizens Power LLC, a Boston based energy trading company, and a vice president with Edison Mission Energy. Prior to that worked at the Federal Reserve Bank as a full examiner.

Posted: September 24th, 2008 under Uncategorized, credit crunch, investment banks, recession.
Comments: none