A few points had held out with flat to mildly higher prices a day earlier, but all of the cash market was united in falling numbers Thursday as moderate spring weather and weak futures ganged up to depress physical prices.

Nearly all trading locations saw double-digit losses that overall ranged from about a nickel to a quarter or so. Except for the smallest ones occurring in Western Canada, where NOVA had recently expressed concern about excess linepack, declines were fairly evenly spread among geographic market areas.

The Energy Information Administration’s report of a 31 Bcf addition to storage during the week ending April 2 was unlikely to inspire a price rally as it exceeded consensus estimates in the mid to upper 20s Bcf. Nymex traders acknowledged the report’s bearishness in sending May futures another 11 cents lower (see related story).

Thursday’s screen softness combined with continuing cool-to-mild weather forecasts and the usual weekend loss of industrial demand virtually guaranteed further cash price losses Friday.

The South is pretty much bereft of any remaining air conditioning load, with few locations getting above 70 Friday. And a cold front is squelching the above-normal temperatures that the Northeast had seen at midweek.

There might be a small amount of heating load in the Midwest, with Chicago and Detroit lows in the mid 30s Friday, but that obviously did not inspire any gas price strength Thursday, suggesting that some end-users may have used storage supplies with the expectation of replenishing them at cheaper prices later.

Even the Rockies market is climbing out of the freezer with lows of slightly above 32 or higher expected Friday, meaning the West will generally be chilly to mild.

A utility buyer in the South said his company had a strong amount of air conditioning load in the first couple of days of the week, but that was pretty much gone by Thursday. Instead of continuing storage injections, the utility expects to use baseload supplies for immediate burns in the next few days, he said. However, the buyer said he didn’t see any problem in catching up on storage refills over the next few months.

A Midcontinent producer reported seeing cash prices softening toward the end of trading, primarily because of the Nymex weakness. There was a fair amount of storage buying in the region, he said, but plenty of gas was available for that demand. It’s “cool, but not especially cold,” he said.

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