Defying the conventional wisdom that lower gas demand over aweekend usually causes softer prices, cash prices put on a show ofstrength Friday with nearly all points rising by a nickel or more.An increase of less than a penny in the Henry Hub futures contractprovided little support for the cash market, so sources concludedit must have been the residual effect from Thursday’s screen run-upof nearly a dime that helped push up cash quotes Friday.

Weather fundamentals remained lacking for the most part, buttraders saw enough heat and humidity in Texas and Louisiana andenough cool weather in the Pacific Northwest and western Canada togenerate a modest amount of air conditioning and heating load forgas.

A marketer agreed that Thursday’s screen spike must have beenresponsible for Friday’s cash firmness, but found it hard tounderstand “how the Merc could reverse itself like that afterinitially treating the AGA storage report as bearish.”

Major processing plant outages starting today at Opal and Blancoshould keep the Rockies and San Juan Basin markets strong thisweek, several traders said. One estimated the Opal work willcurtail about 500 MMcf/d today and Tuesday, while the Blancoproject will cut a net of over 700 MMcf/d initially and then lesseramounts later this week.

A Calgary source reported intra-Alberta numbers rising from thehigh C$2.60s into the low to mid C$2.70s as trading went on. Buttraders in markets as diverse as the Northeast and San Juan Basininstead saw a downtrend; the higher prices were early, according tothe Northeast trader. San Juan saw a wide range and “really droppedat the end” into the $1.90s, a marketer said. Demand just dried upafter the California utilities got done with their weekendpurchases, he added.

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