Business tidbits

I pass along the following tidbits of business information that caught my eye this morning:

The auto industry just recorded its worst October for U.S. sales in 13 years;
For most of October, the nearby price of a natural gas futures contract closed at a high of $14.34 per million British thermal units. That was more than twice what natural gas traded for at the beginning of the year. However, an Energy Information Agency inventory report last week revealed an unexpectedly large increase in natural-gas storage just as most of the U.S. was experiencing an unusually mild autumn. Accordingly, the price of a nearby natural gas contract closed yesterday at $11.60 per million BTUs, down almost 20% from last week's highs; and....
Despite record profits, oil and gas companies are reinvesting a surprisingly low percentage of their profits and it is not clear why.