A SENSE OF PANIC IN THE AIR (AGAIN)?

Tough day yesterday with the MLP index falling into a sinkhole and dropping over 4 points at one point. And there was a "throw them out the window feeling" with some of them for awhile like Atlas Pipeline Partners (APL) which dropped 2 points for no reason. The move yesterday was led by some of the big caps like Kinder Morgan (KMP) and Enterprise Products (EPD) but the pain was spread around the whole group for sure. We are in that moving average cluster and the short term technical indicators are still in rally mode.


Meanwhile yields and yield spreads continue to push the limit here as more MLPS join the newly formed 10% yield group. And of course the dow looks like its going to retest that 12000 level very soon. Its a pass/fail test here and will tell us whether we can rally for awhile or if we have another 1000 dow points to lose.



Speaking of 10% yields Eagle Rock Partners (EROC) boosts its distribution by 7% and sits at just under a 10% payout. I think after this round of distribution hikes we can safely say that except for maybe Kinder Morgan (KMP) and 1 or 2 others...MLPS will continue to languish as the overall market sinks. It is becoming clear that this is not going to be the same as 2000-2002 when MLPS (smaller universe then) rallied sharply. This came after a tech bubble and a general underownership of anything boring (ie dividend payers). This time its about credit risk and frozen credit markets and; right or wrong; it seems to be impacting everything except for agriculture stocks. I was hoping the action from earlier this week was a sign of a divergence developing. And maybe it still is the case but 1 day does not a trend make. For those of you looking to add positions my view is to find the biggest distribution growers that have held there own through all of this mess.

Headlines as they break this morning. Story this morning about a liquor store in NYC taking euros as well as dollars. If this isn't the top in the euro...i don't know what is.