Hurricane hype was helping drive the screen upward Monday, andboth the hype and screen strength contributed to a wide mix of cashprices that ranged from slightly softer to as much as 20cents-plus, sources said.

Hurricane Mitch developed over the weekend into one of the mostforceful Atlantic storms in recorded history. However, its movementwas slow as a high-pressure system over the Gulf of Mexico providedresistance to Mitch moving between the gap between western Cuba andMexico’s Yucatan Peninsula. A Houston source said the slow natureof Mitch could keep gas traders guessing into next week about itsimpact.

A couple of producers concurred there is no need for evacuationaction on Gulf platforms at this point, but naturally they willmonitor the situation. “Mitch is a non-event to us so far but seemsto mean something” to both the cash and futures markets, one said.The other noted that “like they predicted, it’s been a weirdhurricane season.” There was essentially nothing this summer, thena bunch of storms got packed into summer, then nothing again untilthe Big Kahuna appears near the end of October, she said.

Except for snow in mountainous parts of the Rocky Mountainstates, there was little if any change since last week infundamental demand factors, one trader said. However, anotherpredicted the hurricane would cause Gulf prices to go above $2today.

The West showed no consistency whatsoever in price trends. At 3and 6 cents down, the Sumas and Stanfield points on Northwest wereamong the day’s weakest. But the biggest gains of a little over 20cents occurred not too far away at the PG&E citygate andSouthern California border. Despite the Rockies snow, an increaseof more than a dime in San Juan Basin combined with less than anickel rise on Northwest to return their basis relationship to amore normal premium for San Juan gas.

Mitch could very well throw a hitch into bidweek plans, amarketer noted. He thinks the hurricane will force many producersand marketers to hold off on baseload sales until the Novemberaftermarket. “Producers will not know for sure how much gas theywill have [flowing] until after the storm passes.”

As it was, bidweek got off to its usual slow start Monday withlittle more than “tire kicking,” an oft-used phrase to describeearly action. A marketer thought Mitch might have had some hand inpushing November San Juan-Blanco numbers to around $2.08 Mondayafter they had been reported at $2.01 late last week. Anothersource reported $2.34 at Malin, $2.25 at Sumas and around $2.20 forthe Rockies in general.

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