Thursday Morning News And Links

Active rigs: 191 189

RBN Energy: Storage of natural gas in the United States. 

A lot of natural gas storage follows a time honored pattern – put gas in during the summer and take it out during the winter.  But it is getting much more complicated than that.  Developments in natural gas production – particularly in the Appalachian (Marcellus) region will be driving big changes through the gas storage business.   Today we pick up on a blog series we started last month to examine the two fundamental value generating gas storage mechanisms, and how they match up with the physical characteristics of storage facilities.

WSJ Links

Section D (Personal Journal):

• For ideal airline competition, look a mile high. A story of what is happening in Denver.

United shrank from 60% of all Denver traffic, including connecting passengers, in 2006 to 40% and remains the Mile High City's largest airline overall. It says it is returning to growth mode in Denver and plans to add 4% capacity this year, including starting Denver's first nonstop flights to Asia with Boeing 787 service to Tokyo's Narita Airport. United also has been expanding flights to cities in North Dakota and Canada around the Bakken Shale oil fields, as Denver has become a gateway for oil-business traffic.

Section C (Money & Investing):

• Jobs report may be kryptonite for Fed.

The thinking goes like this: With the Federal Reserve debating when to begin the dreaded "taper"—the point at which it slows its buying of Treasury and mortgage securities—poor news on employment will keep the printing presses rolling for longer. That, in turn, underpins stock prices. In normal times, by contrast, stocks would sell off on weak jobs growth.

But "good news is bad news" oversimplifies how markets may view upcoming reports on jobless claims and unemployment due on Thursday and Friday, respectively. Goldilocks is a better fit than Bizarro. Popular with strategists in the last bull market, she described an economy that was neither too hot nor too cold to spoil the party.

Expectations around this Friday's nonfarm-payrolls report are for growth of about 170,000 jobs. Mr. Saperstein figures anything below 220,000 to 240,000 won't fully convince traders the economy is strong enough to keep expanding without the Fed's help. On the other hand, a number below 100,000 might leave the Fed looking impotent.

Section B (Marketplace):

Section A:

• Train wreck: support slumping for ObamaCare. Wait until it kicks in.
• Oxygen for premies: regulators putting on hold any regulatory action against hospitals, saying that its rules could be misunderstood.
• TSA cancels plans on allowing small knives on planes.
• Op-ed: the hidden jobless disaster. Nothing that we didn't already know.At the present slow pace of job growth, it will require more than a decade to get back to full employment defined by prerecession standards. 
• Op-ed: what Enron and the IRS have in common.Ethical meltdowns are rarely the work of a few rogue workers. They take their cues from toxic leadership.