REGENCY AND ENERGY TRANSFER HOOK UP!

Energy Transfer (ETP) is buying 100% of the general partner of Regency Partners (RGNC) from General Electric for 300 million bucks. As always with these things they are never simple and the devil is in the details. They are going to use Energy Transfer Equity (ETE) as the holder of all this. The companies will continue to trade as separate entities. So in the end ETE will be the GP for both ETP AND RGNC. From the press release:

We have been actively looking for growth and acquisition opportunities for ETE for some time,” said Kelcy Warren, ETE’s chairman of the board of directors. “The opportunity to acquire interests in Regency made sense on many levels. Distributions from Regency not only help to diversify ETE, but they also enhance its ability to increase distributions over time by pursuing new growth opportunities at both ETP and Regency. While ETP and Regency will be competitors in the midstream space, they will be run by highly talented management teams that will look for opportunities to work together.”

Conference call this morning at 9am should explain a few things. So far in the pre market there doesnt seem to be much interest on either side and when we've seen these things happen before, its usually met with a big yawn as far as price moves are concerned. But i will keep an open mind.

Quicksilver Gas (KGS) put up earnings yesterday and UBS responds by cutting their target on the stock while keeping it at a buy. No trades yet in the pre market. Not much else happening this morning on the corporate side. The distribution cycle is done and checks will be arriving shortly.

Overall this morning we're seeing 100 points of giveback this morning as the Euro sells off to 1.26 and Euro markets are down the day after the rescue. Dow futures down about 100 points as of this post. Crude is down, rates are down, the dollar up. With volatility stretched moves will remain relatively large here until the bouncing ball settles down with smaller and smaller moves. But this needs a little time to play out so dramamine remains the order of the day. Keep it close by.

The Preakness draw will be taking place i believe today so i will be looking for my horse. Icebox who was the best horse not to win the Derby last week skips this race and heads for the Belmont 3 weeks from Saturday where the 1 1/2 mile distance suits him perfectly. I have some ideas for this race but i want to wait and see how the draw shapes up and of course i will share my thoughts.