Despite flurries of trading activity near the open and thenagain near the close, natural gas futures trading was extremelyquiet yesterday as most traders elected to morph their three-dayweekend into a four-day holiday.

After opening stronger and notching a new all-time commodityhigh, the January contract spiraled lower during the first 30minutes of trading as trade selling was once again seen near the$10.00 level. However, bulls saved their best for last and with thehelp of heavy market-on-close buying were successful in pushingprices back above unchanged late in the session. The Januarycontract led all months, rising 22.6 cents to close at $9.805.Estimated volume was extremely light with 28,383 contracts changinghands.

For Ed Kennedy of Miami-based Pioneer Futures, the mostconspicuous feature of yesterday’s session was the lack ofoptions-related futures activity. While a move like the one seenlate yesterday would have normally spooked market makers who soldcalls that they never thought would be in the money, the low openinterest at those strike prices made it almost a non-event for thefutures market, he said.

In lieu of options-related dealings, bull traders were onceagain egged on by forecasts calling for continued cold temperaturesacross much of the East. According to the latest six- to 10-dayforecast released yesterday afternoon by the National WeatherService, normal and above-normal temperatures will be starklycontrasted with below normal readings in the eastern half of thecountry including all of the state of Texas. Also of interest togas traders yesterday were forecasts yesterday calling for anotherwinter storm later this week for the major population centers ofChicago, Washington, DC, Philadelphia, New York and Boston.

Looking ahead, the weather will take a backseat, at least for alittle while Wednesday, when the AGA announces fresh storage data.Kennedy predicts the AGA will announce a 176 Bcf withdrawal versuslast year’s 173 Bcf release and the five-year average of 148 Bcf.In the past two weeks the market has pulled 158 Bcf from the groundeach week. The January contract will expire at 3:10 p.m. (EST)tomorrow, about an hour after the storage data is released.

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