WILLIAMS RESTRUCTURING

The idea is to enhance growth and make Williams LP (WPZ,WMZ) a self funding mlp. The company says it plans to raise the distribution 3.5% beginning in Q1 2010. The setup is immediately accretive and no changes are made to 2010 guidance. My guess is that there should be a positive reaction to this and as the charts show the 2 mlps have done well particularly WPZ which has been rising faster relative to the mlp index since the summer.

Kinder Morgan (KMP) will kick off the mlp earnings parade after the close tomorrow so we should be looking forward to that. We have seen a few mlps dribble out their distribution announcements in the last few weeks but now comes the bulk of announcements.

Not much else on the corporate side this morning as we come back from a 3 day weekend. Stock futures are a little lower. The dollar is higher. Oil is lower and nat gas is down 3% as warmer weather has spread across the US at least for now. The dollar is up against the Euro and yen this morning. At some point a correction is coming sooner or later. MLPs continue to hold up well relative to the rest of the markets. We go down less on downdays and up more on up days. Friday we had some nice relative outperformance.