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Enron Mail |
As part of the newly started revision of the NPTA terms, a group of some 16
people meet in Stockholm yesterday for a half-day session at the offices of the Swedish SE Bank. Since only half of the attendees were lawyers, and just the SE Bank attorney attending the meeting and myself have any greater experience from derivatives documentation and trading, the discussion was initially somewhat unstructured but gradually got on track; and I think I actually managed quite well in stiring the process towards a decent result. Minutes was taken and will be circulated in about a week. In brief the following was agreed: An new Nordic financial power trading master is to be created. This document shall be in English and be Anglo-American styled and contain all customary provisions and a schedule (plus proposed collateral arrangements and, if possible, a short Users Guide). The intention is not to reinvent the wheel but rather to collect and seek inspiration from existing derivatives documentation in different markets. I suggested that a law firm should be assigned to prepare the new doc., but the meeting rather thought that the initial work should be done by a working group (including Enron, the SE Bank, Eastern Energy, National Power, Sydkraft and Statkraft) and that legal opinions should be obtained in due course as to the enforceability of the new documentation in different jurisdictions. The governing law issue was the issue mostly discussed and it was agreed that this matter supposedly had to be left to the option of the contracting parties. The idea is to have the Nordic Power Traders' Association promote the new documentation,thereby obtaining wide acceptance for it in the market place. Since Enron is the only party in the formed working group experienced in both derivatives and commodities, this may be a chance for the company, if it desires, to take the initiative and promote, for instance, something in line with the ECT Houston Industrial Master. The new doc. is thought to serve as a standard doc. for players that is unwilling, or unable, to use the ISDA documentation. I'll keep you posted on the progress and please let me have your viewpoints. Martin
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