CEO Taps Duo To Help Him Manage Enron
The Wall Street Journal, 08/29/01
Two Are Promoted as Enron Seeks Executive Stability
The New York Times, 08/29/01
COMPANIES & FINANCE INTERNATIONAL - Enron chief appoints heirs to the throne.
Financial Times, 08/29/01
Enron Promotes 2 Execs to Office of Chairman
Los Angeles Times, 08/29/01
Two Top Executives Named to Join Enron's Office of Chairman
KRTBN Knight-Ridder Tribune Business News: Houston Chronicle - Texas, 08/29/01
World Watch
The Wall Street Journal, 08/29/01
INDIA PRESS: BSES Eyes Enron's Stake In Dabhol Power Co
Dow Jones International News, 08/29/01
FIs planning out-of-court settlement in Enron project
The Times of India, 08/29/01
INDIA PRESS:BG May Buy Enron's Stake In Oil, Gas Fields
Dow Jones International News, 08/28/01
Pooling Point Oper Names New CEO, Part Of Strategy Change
Dow Jones Energy Service, 08/28/01
USA: INTERVIEW-Enron still seeks opportunities beyond gas/power.
Reuters English News Service, 08/28/01



CEO Taps Duo To Help Him Manage Enron
By Rebecca Smith
Staff Reporter of The Wall Street Journal

08/29/2001
The Wall Street Journal
A4
(Copyright (c) 2001, Dow Jones & Company, Inc.)

Two weeks after his hand-picked successor quit, Enron Corp. Chairman Kenneth Lay tapped two veteran managers from Enron's wholesale-services unit to help him run the energy company. 
Mark Frevert, 46 years old, was named vice chairman and Greg Whalley, 39, was named president and chief operating officer. Mr. Lay, who has extended his employment contract by two years through 2005 after the surprise departure of Jeffrey Skilling, said he will remain chief executive for at least four more years while he works to restore the company's sagging stock price.
Mr. Frevert and Mr. Whalley were traveling yesterday and couldn't be reached for comment. But Mr. Lay said he picked the pair because "they're very capable leaders with a lot of experience throughout the company." 
Mr. Frevert is one of only a handful of people who have been at Enron, Houston, since its creation in 1986. Prior to that, he worked in strategic planning at Houston Natural Gas when Mr. Lay was its chairman. Most recently, Mr. Frevert headed Enron's wholesale-services unit, which is the primary driver of its earnings and has been instrumental in a strong push into energy marketing and trading activities in Europe. 
The wholesale-services unit is responsible for commodities trading and the management of Enron's unregulated power-generating assets. 
In its second-quarter earnings, Enron said natural-gas volumes doubled and electricity sales grew fivefold in Europe from the second quarter of 2000. Europe now accounts for one-quarter of Enron's total trading volume. The company doesn't currently disclose the percentage of earnings attributable to Europe, but Mr. Lay said "this may be something we'll be doing by year end," in keeping with his emphasis on releasing more detailed financial information. 
Mr. Whalley, who has worked at Enron since 1992, most recently was president and chief operating officer of Enron's wholesale-services unit. Before that, he was completing graduate work at Stanford University and served as a U.S. Army officer. 
Mr. Whalley was partly responsible for Enron's Internet-based trading platform, Enron Online, and served as its "senior sponsor" within the corporation. "Greg is a strong proponent of technology to gain a competitive advantage," said Mr. Lay. 
Analysts believed the pair of managers were front-runners. But Mr. Lay said there's no guarantee either will succeed him as chief executive. "Either could be CEO, but there are three or four others" that are in the running as well, he said. "They need to become more familiar to the financial community. We're in no hurry."

Copyright ? 2000 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 	

Business/Financial Desk; Section C
Two Are Promoted as Enron Seeks Executive Stability
By RICHARD A. OPPEL Jr.

08/29/2001
The New York Times
Page 2, Column 1
c. 2001 New York Times Company

DALLAS, Aug. 28 -- With its stock still suffering after the unexpected departure of its chief executive, the Enron Corporation today promoted a top official in its core energy-trading business to be the company's No. 2 executive as it begins finding new leadership. 
Greg Whalley, 39, was named president and chief operating officer. Also, the company promoted Mark A. Frevert, 46, to vice chairman. Both will join Kenneth L. Lay, the chairman and chief executive, in an office of the chairman.
The moves come two weeks after Jeffrey K. Skilling, a longtime protege of Mr. Lay who was the architect of Enron's wholesale energy-trading business, quit unexpectedly after just six months as chief executive. Mr. Lay, 59, has reassumed the role of chief executive and has extended his commitment to stay at the company until the end of 2005. 
Mr. Skilling's departure, which he said was for ''purely personal'' reasons that he would not disclose, stunned investors, and the company's shares fell 14 percent in the next two days. In trading today, shares of Enron rose 40 cents, to $38.16, after peaking at $90 a year ago. 
Mr. Whalley was president and chief operating officer of Enron Wholesale Services, the energy-trading unit that provides most of the company's operating income and revenue. A former officer in the Army, Mr. Whalley joined the company in 1992. He will ''be somewhat more kind of the operations person on a day-to-day basis,'' Mr. Lay said in an interview. 
Mr. Frevert was previously Mr. Whalley's boss as chairman and chief executive of Enron Wholesale Services. He started with a predecessor company to Enron, Houston Natural Gas, in 1984, and is completing a doctorate in economics from Rice University. 
The announcement today clearly makes the two men, in particular Mr. Whalley, leading candidates to become chief executive, but Mr. Lay asserted that others at Enron, whom he declined to identify, were also potential successors. 
''Obviously, these would be two of the people on the list,'' Mr. Lay said, but he said others include ''various people depending on how they do the next two to three years.'' Finding a new chief executive, however, may take as long as four or five years, he said. ''The main thing I need to convey is that I and the board are not in a big hurry on that.'' 
In the interview, Mr. Lay said no one from Enron's board ever voiced disapproval of Mr. Skilling or in any way played a role in his departure, and Mr. Lay said that on several occasions he had asked Mr. Skilling to reconsider his decision to leave. He also said Mr. Skilling's personal reasons for leaving, while not health related, were ''things with fairly short time fuses on them'' and were ''something he can't wait two or three years to address.'' 
An immediate test for both Mr. Whalley and Mr. Frevert will be winning the respect and confidence of investors after the sharp slide in Enron shares this year as analysts questioned whether the company can continue to improve earnings as prices for natural gas and electricity -- its two biggest products -- have declined. The stock has also been hit by fallout from a number of missteps, including the troubled Dabhol power plant project in India and an expensive and unprofitable foray into trading telecommunications bandwidth. 
Andre Meade, head of United States utilities research at Commerzbank Securities, said a chief problem was that energy trading and marketing account for a far bigger part of Enron's market capitalization than they do at other unregulated energy companies, but Enron's financial disclosures largely do not break down this business to show the profitability of different products and different regions. 
''All that is compressed into one set of numbers, and it's really hard for analysts to determine where they are making money in a given quarter and where they are losing money,'' Mr. Meade said. 
He added that Enron's having so much of its market capitalization tied up in a business that is so difficult for investors to understand ''is really disconcerting.'' 
Neither Mr. Whalley nor Mr. Frevert were available for comment, an Enron spokesman said. In the interview today, Mr. Lay, reiterating comments made to The Wall Street Journal, said he would try to make Enron's financials and business model more easily understood to investors. 
''Analysts have expressed some concerns about that, and we're addressing those concerns,'' he said, though he added that ''they'll probably never get all the information they want.'' Enron will break out more information on business segments and geographic results, he said, but he also said the company would probably not provide profit and loss numbers for natural gas and electricity -- by far the biggest products it trades. 
He also confirmed that Enron has ''unwound'' a series of complex deals it had entered into with partnerships that included Enron's chief financial officer, Andrew Fastow. The transactions had been done for hedging and tax reasons, he said. 
Enron's financial statements include other complex transactions. For example, the most recent 10-K states that Enron might be required to issue new shares of common stock if the price falls below levels ranging from $28.20 to $55 because of ''certain financial contracts.'' Enron's stock has been below $55 for the last three months, but the company has not had to issue shares, a spokesman said. Enron may end up not having to issue any shares, he said, and any that are issued are already accounted for in diluted earnings per share.

Photo: Greg Whalley was named president and chief operating officer. He joined Enron in 1992. (Bloomberg News) 
Copyright ? 2000 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 	


COMPANIES & FINANCE INTERNATIONAL - Enron chief appoints heirs to the throne.
By SHEILA MCNULTY.

08/29/2001
Financial Times
(c) 2001 Financial Times Limited . All Rights Reserved

Kenneth Lay, head of US energy giant Enron, took the first step toward replacing Jeffrey Skilling as chief executive with the appointments yesterday of two senior executives to the chairman's office. 
Mr Lay chose Greg Whalley, president and chief operating officer of Enron Wholesale Services, and Mark Frevert, chairman and chief executive of Enron Wholesale Services, from his shortlist of five candidates.
He has said the men chosen would be in the running for chief executive once he steps down, although he would continue to consider other executives who show potential. 
In line with their appointments, Mr Whalley has been promoted to president and chief operating officer of Enron, while Mr Frevert has been promoted to vice-chairman of the company. 
"In addition to having led Enron Wholesale Services, they have a collective 26 years of extensive experience across Enron's businesses and both played key roles in increasing our deliveries of energy and other commodities in North America and Europe," Mr Lay said. 
Mr Whalley, 39, holds a bachelor's degree from the United States Military Academy and an MBA from the Stanford Graduate School of Business. 
His fellow appointee, Mr Frevert, 46, has a bachelor's degree in economics from Albion College in Michigan. He has completed all the requirements except the final dissertation for a PhD in economics from Rice University. 
Mr Lay plans to take his time to ensure he has the right person for the job and told the Financial Times last week that he has agreed to stay on as chief executive until at least the end of 2005, and would stay even longer if needed. 
His predecessor, Mr Skilling, left after just six months in the job, citing personal reasons. His exit, following the departures of several other executives, has left analysts wondering about the remaining depth of talent at the company. 
Mr Lay said Enron's senior management committee of 25 executives has an average age of 41 and an average tenure of 11 years. 
"You've got some that have 15 to 20 years service, and you've got others that have six or seven, but I think they are a very experienced team and very capable of continuing to lead this company." 
(c) Copyright Financial Times Ltd. All rights reserved. 
http://www.ft.com.

Copyright ? 2000 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 	

Business; Financial Desk
Enron Promotes 2 Execs to Office of Chairman
From Bloomberg News

08/29/2001
Los Angeles Times
Home Edition
C-3
Copyright 2001 / The Times Mirror Company

HOUSTON -- Enron Corp., the largest energy trader, on Tuesday promoted Greg Whalley and Mark Frevert to the office of the chairman, making them the top candidates for the chief executive's job Jeffrey Skilling left two weeks ago. 
Whalley, 39, was named president and chief operating officer. He had held those titles at Enron Wholesale Services, the energy- and commodity-trading unit that brings in most of Enron's revenue. Frevert, 46, was chairman and chief executive of Wholesale Services. He was named vice chairman.
Chairman Kenneth Lay said the two executives will help run the company while he selects Skilling's successor. 
Investors pushed Enron's shares down more than 14% in the two days after Skilling quit. 
Lay wasn't more specific about the two men's assignments. 
"They'll be looking at all of the businesses--the wholesale unit, government affairs. Anything that affects Enron," Lay said. 
Shares of Enron rose 40 cents to close at $38.16 on the New York Stock Exchange. They have plunged 56% in the last year as Enron's plan to trade space on telecommunications networks collapsed along with the fortunes of Internet companies, and investors questioned whether Enron can continue to post huge gains in energy-trading sales and profit. 
Skilling helped Lay transform Enron from a natural-gas pipeline company into the top competitor in energy trading. Before Tuesday, they were the only executives in the office of the chairman. 
Skilling became chief executive in February as Lay, 59, held on to the chairman's title. Skilling said Aug. 14 he quit for personal and family reasons, though he later said worry caused by the recent stock price decline contributed to his decision. Lay, who has taken over as chief executive, has had his employment contract extended to 2005. 
Lay has been meeting investors and analysts to calm fears the firm may be hiding bad financial news, and that he will have a difficult time finding a new chief executive.

Copyright ? 2000 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 	

Two Top Executives Named to Join Enron's Office of Chairman
Laura Goldberg

08/29/2001
KRTBN Knight-Ridder Tribune Business News: Houston Chronicle - Texas
Copyright (C) 2001 KRTBN Knight Ridder Tribune Business News; Source: World Reporter (TM)

Enron Corp. named the two men in charge of its wholesale business Tuesday to join Ken Lay in the office of the chairman. 
Both are considered candidates to take over the chief executive officer's role, which Lay, Enron's chairman, reclaimed two weeks ago when Jeff Skilling unexpectedly resigned.
Greg Whalley, 39, president and chief operating officer of Enron Wholesale Services, was named president and chief operating officer of the company. 
Mark Frevert, 46, chairman and chief executive officer of Enron Wholesale Services, was named vice chairman of Enron. 
The wholesale business, which includes marketing and trading of energy and other commodities such as metals, is Enron's core operation and main profit driver. 
For the first six months of 2001, wholesale services brought in nearly $97 billion in revenues. Enron itself reported $100.2 billion in revenues for the first half of the year. 
Both Whalley and Frevert played key roles in boosting the company's deliveries of energy and other commodities in North America and Europe, Lay said. 
"They share a number of things in common," Lay said. "They are good leaders." 
The two will work with Lay in the chairman's office to run the company and set its strategy. 
Both were traveling on business for Enron Tuesday and not available for comment. 
Tuesday's announcement was set in motion when Skilling surprised Wall Street by saying he was stepping down for personal and family reasons after only six months in the chief executive's job. 
Lay stressed it's not automatic that Whalley or Frevert would eventually take over as chief executive. A few other Enron executives are potential CEO candidates. 
"These are the two best-qualified candidates right now to work with me in running Enron," Lay said. "Time will tell whether these two or one of a few other people will become the CEO to replace me someday." 
It could take two to four years before a replacement is ready, and Lay pledged to remain at the helm until then. 
At the end of regular trading, shares in Enron closed up 40 cents at $38.16. 
Andre Meade, an analyst who follows Enron at at Commerzbank Securities, who follows Enron, said the announcement contained no surprises, "which is a good thing." 
"They are two senior managers that had significant roles in the real growth businesses at Enron, which are the wholesale businesses both in the U.S. and Europe," Meade said. 
Whalley, who joined Enron in 1992, has a bachelor's degree from the U.S. Military Academy in West Point, N.Y., and an MBA from Stanford University's Graduate School of Business. 
His past Enron jobs include heading the European commodity merchant business, chief executive of global risk management and chief executive of Enron North America. 
Frevert, who joined Enron predecessor Houston Natural Gas in 1984, has a bachelor's degree in economics from Albion College in Michigan. He must finish his final dissertation to get a Ph.D. in economics from Rice University. 
Frevert was in charge of both North American natural gas marketing activities and international energy service operations. He also was chief executive of Enron Europe. 
Lay doesn't plan to name replacements for Whalley and Frevert to head up the wholesale operation. Instead, to streamline, the individual wholesale business segments will report to the office of the chairman. 
Other organizational fine-tuning is expected. 
Enron's stock traded as high as $82 at the end of January and was later battered for a number of reasons, including the collapse of the company's broadband business, fallout from California's energy crisis and continuing disputes surrounding a power plant project in India. 
Investors and analysts also have been asking Enron to release more detailed financial information -- something Lay recently said he would do. 
"The core thing that Ken Lay needs to do is restore some confidence in the story," Meade said, including following through with data disclosure.

Copyright ? 2000 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 	


International
World Watch
Compiled by David I. Oyama

08/29/2001
The Wall Street Journal
A6
(Copyright (c) 2001, Dow Jones & Company, Inc.)

ASIA/PACIFIC 
Indian Lenders Consider Dabhol Buyout 
Indian lenders are considering a way of buying out U.S. energy company Enron's 65% stake in the controversy-torn $2.9 billion power project of its Dabhol Power unit in India, a person in the banking industry said. The Indian lenders, who have a total exposure of about $1.4 billion, are discussing forming a special-purpose vehicle to buy the Dabhol plant, he said, adding that a decision on whether to pursue that option is expected in the next few days. 

Copyright ? 2000 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 	


INDIA PRESS: BSES Eyes Enron's Stake In Dabhol Power Co

08/29/2001
Dow Jones International News
(Copyright (c) 2001, Dow Jones & Company, Inc.)

NEW DELHI -(Dow Jones)- India's BSES Ltd. (P.BSX) is eyeing Enron Corp.'s (ENE) controlling stake in Dabhol Power Co., reports the Business Standard. 
"The capital cost of the (Dabhol) project has to be brought down. The fuel cost too has to be decreased and delinked from the dollar. These are the fundamental issues which need to be sorted out before prudent investors can touch the project," the newspaper quotes BSES Chairman and Managing Director R.V. Shahi as saying.
When asked by the newspaper whether these prudent investors included BSES, Shahi said: "Yes." 
Shahi said, there was no question of touching Enron's DPC stake under the present project structure. The "excessive" capital cost of the $2.9 billion Dabhol project and the high cost of dollar-denominated fuel have resulted in unaffordable power tariffs for consumer. A complete financial reengineering will have to be done before the project becomes viable, he added. 
Web site: www.business-standard.com 

-By Himendra Kumar; Dow Jones Newswires; 91-11-461-9426; himendra.kumar@dowjones.com

Copyright ? 2000 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 	

FIs planning out-of-court settlement in Enron project
Baiju Kalesh

08/29/2001
The Times of India
Copyright (C) 2001 The Times of India; Source: World Reporter (TM)

MUMBAI: Domestic FIs are planning to have an out-of-court settlement between Enron and MSEB on various issues as part of their exercise to complete the second phase of the project. 
The FIs have initiated this exercise due to the apprehension of funds availability in the current escrow account, especially since the loan repayment to the institutions is due in September and the pre-termination notice from Enron is applicable from November.
The interest payments for the loans will dry up by September and Enron will not be able to service either the interest or the principal since the first phase has been shut down due to differences over the PPA between MSEB and the US utility major. 
"Currently we are not looking at any buyer for the project, but finding ways to complete and run it," a senior FI official familiar with the negotiations said. "An early solution for Enron is to find a buyer who is acceptable to us, since they wanted to quit India," he added. 
Enron has valued the equity of the project at $ 1.1 billion. 
A senior level committee with representatives from IDBI, ICICI Ltd, SBI and IFCI has been set up to ink an action plans to resolve the imbroglio.

Copyright ? 2000 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 	


INDIA PRESS:BG May Buy Enron's Stake In Oil, Gas Fields

08/28/2001
Dow Jones International News
(Copyright (c) 2001, Dow Jones & Company, Inc.)

NEW DELHI -(Dow Jones)- Enron Corp. (ENE) is believed to have accepted an offer of $340 million from British Gas for the sale of its 30% stake in India's Panna, Mukta and Tapti oil and natural gas fields, reports The Financial Express, citing unnamed sources. 
Both Enron India and British Gas spokesmen declined to comment when approached by the newspaper, the report says.
The Panna-Mukta-Tapti oil and gas fields currently produce around 300 million cubic meters of gas and about 29,000 barrels a day of crude oil, the report added. 
Web site: http://www.financialexpress.com 
-By Himendra Kumar; Dow Jones Newswires; 91-11-461-9426; himendra.kumar@dowjones.com

Copyright ? 2000 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 	

Pooling Point Oper Names New CEO, Part Of Strategy Change
By Erwin Seba
Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES

08/28/2001
Dow Jones Energy Service
(Copyright (c) 2001, Dow Jones & Company, Inc.)

HOUSTON -(Dow Jones)- A company founded on the promise of bandwidth trading two years ago named a new chief executive Tuesday as part of its ongoing change in strategy. 
LighTrade Inc. named Kathleen Perone, the company's chairman of the board, as chief executive. She replaces Ted Pierson, who founded the company to provide neutral pooling points for the nascent bandwidth trading market.
The change is part of the company's ongoing switch from serving the moribund bandwidth trading market to doing longer-term contracts for connections between telecommunications carrier networks. 
"Whether or not any sort of trading market develops, the carriers can utilize us now," Perone told Dow Jones Newswires. "The downturn in capital markets has created significant problems for the telecoms." 
Among those problems are the inability to fund interconnections between networks. Perone also suggested that, with consolidation among carriers expected in the next year or so, they may consider using LighTrade's pooling points to interconnect newly acquired networks quickly. 
Pooling points are network interconnections where ownership of bandwidth is transferred from one company to another. They are also used to monitor quality of service. 
Perone, 48 years old, has 23 years of experience in telecommunications. She is a managing director of Acappella Ventures LLC., a venture capital firm and one of the original investors in LighTrade. She will continue in that job as well. 
Pierson and Perone said the change was made as the company switches from the startup phase to the operational phase. 
"It's a natural evolution," Pierson, now vice chairman of the board, told Dow Jones Newswires. "I'm a starter and an entrepreneur. I'm not an operational CEO." 
Pierson described Perone as well-known in the telecommunications industry and "a superior marketer and salesperson." 
Perone said LighTrade will also call upon her knowledge of venture capital markets. The private company is projected to be cash-flow positive in 18 months, but it doesn't have financing on hand to reach early 2003, she said. 
"We are funded for the time being," Perone said. "We can go long enough." 
LighTrade is the only company offering neutral pooling points. Enron Corp. (ENE), Williams Communications Group Inc. (WCG) and Dynegy Inc. (DYN) all have bandwidth pooling points in the networks operated by their telecommunications units. 
Those pooling points, however, may be unappealing to potential customers. To deliver bandwidth, the pooling point operator must know who the customer is, raising fears that it could use that knowledge to steal the customer. 
LighTrade, with eight pooling points compared with Enron's 22, offers a non-competing alternative to the energy companies in the bandwidth market. LighTrade doesn't trade bandwidth. 
But the company faces increased competition from network exchange centers, an industry analyst said. 
Companies like Universal Access, a subsidiary of UAXS Global Holdings Inc. (UAXS), operate exchange centers where a number of network providers can interconnect, creating "virtual pooling points," Yankee Group Analyst Seth Libbey told Dow Jones Newswires. "They're fulfilling the promise of the virtual pooling point," he said. 
A virtual pooling point is a series of networks connected to each other for traditional telecom business, not for bandwidth trading purposes. Some carriers say that virtual pooling points could be used for bandwidth trading. 
Physical pooling points like the ones LighTrade operates are only attractive if they are neutral and connected to large numbers of longhaul and metropolitan network carriers. 
"LighTrade's a victim of what's going on in the bandwidth market," he said. "There's a lot of action in trading, but not a lot of capacity being transferred." 
LighTrade plans to increase the number of pooling points it operates to 15 by first quarter 2002. 

-By Erwin Seba, Dow Jones Newswires, 713-547-9214 erwin.seba@dowjones.com

Copyright ? 2000 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 	

USA: INTERVIEW-Enron still seeks opportunities beyond gas/power.
By Andrew Kelly

08/28/2001
Reuters English News Service
(C) Reuters Limited 2001.

HOUSTON, Aug 28 (Reuters) - Enron Corp. may have scaled down its broadband telecommunications plans, but it will continue to pursue opportunities beyond its traditional core wholesale natural gas and electricity markets. 
Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Ken Lay said in an interview Tuesday that recent ventures into the wholesale marketing and trading of paper, coal and steel looked "very promising.".
"We'll continue to do those," he told Reuters. "Those are becoming very significant businesses. Particularly this year we've had really strong growth in pulp and paper, in coal and in weather derivatives and some of the other new activities." 
Enron expects to get its broadband business on a sound footing, even though the potential market for buying and selling broadband capacity, also know as bandwidth, now appears to be much more modest than Enron and others had previously assumed. 
"We still think we'll develop a very nice business there over the next two or three years," Lay said. 
Enron also continues to see good opportunities for its energy services business, which takes care of energy purchasing and management for customers such as retailer J.C. Penney Co. Inc. and drug firm Eli Lilly & Co. 
Lay was speaking after Enron said two long-time employees, Greg Whalley and Mark Frevert, will join Lay in the office of the chairman, strengthening the senior management team after the surprise resignation of Jeff Skilling as CEO on Aug. 14. 
PLEDGE TO PROVIDE MORE INFORMATION 
Lay said Enron will do a better job of explaining its finances and operations to investors and analysts in the future, starting as soon as the company's third-quarter earnings report. 
"I've heard that criticism, I'm listening to it and yes we will address it. We will start providing more detailed information," he said. 
Shortcomings in this area are one of several factors cited for a sharp drop in Enron's share price from levels of just over $90 a year ago to recent levels in the mid-$30s. 
Lay said Enron will continue to sell off physical assets around the world such as pipelines and power plants and focus on the knowledge-based marketing, trading and risk-management activities that it regards as its true strength. 
"We will certainly continue to emphasize monetizing some of the international assets, particularly in developing countries, and bring that cash or capital back into the company, either to redeploy it in these faster growing and higher return businesses, or to buy in shares or pay down debt," he said. 
Enron recently sought to disengage from India, offering to sell its majority stake in the Dabhol power plant project project for $1 billion to extricate itself from a long and bitter dispute over payments for the power generated by the plant. 
Lay said recent comments he made about the Dabhol project in an interview with the Financial Times were "mischaracterized" as a call by Enron for retaliatory U.S. sanctions against India. 
"We've not asked for sanctions and it really got blown out of proportion," he said. 
Lay declined to comment on an idea floated by Indian lenders to buy out Enron's stake in the Dabhol project if the cost of the electricity produced by the plant can be lowered, saying only that Enron was continuing to talk to all parties involved. 
"It's still problematical as to where that may be headed," he said of the Dabhol project.

Copyright ? 2000 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved.