A new futures contract for the physical delivery of crude in the Houston area may only be a few months away from launching. Enterprise Products Partners LP and Magellan Midstream Partners, the pipeline companies responsible for delivery of Houston’s two active futures contracts, said Thursday they are joining forces to create a broader benchmark. That may happen in a few months, said Bruce Heine, a Magellan spokesman. The Houston contracts reflect a shift in the oil industry’s focus from the storage hub in Cushing, Oklahoma, the delivery point for New York-traded futures, to the Gulf Coast. A global appetite for U.S. ... (full story)