The softening trend that developed about halfway through bidweekcarried over to the fledgling August aftermarket. In swing dealsdone Friday for the weekend, quotes at nearly all points were downseveral cents from index levels and often near the bottom end ofbidweek ranges.

“With prices as low as they are, we felt safer going a littlelong into the month,” a Texas marketer said. “However, I get thefeeling others shared that opinion, so there might be a lot ofsupply [availability] if weather doesn’t show up.”

It doesn’t look as if weather will show up, at least for sometime. The Midwest and Northeast should remain cool through at leastthe first week of August, one forecasting firm said, and evenDallas will get a break this week from a long stretch ofconsecutive 100-degree-plus days. Oklahoma already was cooling offFriday from recent torrid conditions, a Tulsa source said. AndTropical Storm Alex, still trudging westward about two-thirds ofthe way across the Atlantic, was running into wind shears thatcould hamper its ability to strengthen, one forecaster said.

A marketer thinks a lot of people are long at the Northeastcitygate points of Texas Eastern M-3 and Transco Zone 6, whichportends softness there unless Alex should actually make it intothe Gulf production area this week, he said.

Waha and Katy uncharacteristically were trading about even witheach other in the mid $1.80s Friday. Waha was maintaining itsrelatively lofty level due to continuing air conditioning load fromutilities in North Texas, a trader told Daily GPI. The threebiggest shippers on Oasis have turned back their capacity, he said,so currently there is essentially no flow from Waha to Katy.

Western points tended to stay closest to index numbers in theaftermarket. Malin was actually trading for the weekend around thetop of its bidweek range, based mainly on high numbers at thePG&E citygate, a marketer said.

Bidweek wound up Friday with late deals being done approximatelyat the same lower levels that had been reached Thursday. Even theSouthern California border, which had resisted the general bidweeksoftening with a small move up into the low $2.30s Thursday, wasback to trading around $2.30 or slightly less Friday, a buyer said.

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