June bidweek activity heightened considerably Thursday astraders sprinted toward the finish line, either trying to wind upeverything Thursday or leave only a few tail-end deals to completetoday. A marketer who made six Chicago citygate deals in a verytight range on either side of $2.30 said June prices were justbarely higher despite a gain of more than a nickel in the JulyHenry Hub futures contract. He thought the lack of volatility wasdue to many people leaving early for a long weekend. If moretraders were still around and working there would be more input andbreadth to the ranges.

A California buyer came up with a rather innovative structuringof June supply. She bought 5 MMcf/d at GPI’s Southern Californiaborder index plus 0.25 for seven-day-a-week deliveries. However,another package of 5 MMcf/d will be at the GPI index plus 0.5; shepaid a slightly higher premium to take that gas on weekdays only.That was done to avoid potential oversupply penalties on weekends,she said.

The late-May swing market was dwindling rapidly to no one’ssurprise. Nearly all points ranged from flat to about a couple ofcents higher. Sumas and Westcoast Station 2, though tradingapproximately flat most of the morning, got “hammered” at the endas there seemed to be more and more long supply positions emerging,a marketer said. But the late weakness at those British Columbiapoints failed to carry over into neighboring province of Alberta,where quotes went up a couple of pennies. A Calgary source said shewas “anticipating, although I’m not sure that’s the right word,”the big NOVA outages starting Monday that will take about 940MMcf/d off the market through June 9. That should keep theintra-Alberta market strong through the first week and a half ofJune, she said.

Despite a San Juan Basin supply disruption of about 270 MMcf/d thatwas extended through at least today when El Paso was unable tocomplete Blanco Plant maintenance as scheduled Thursday (see Transportation Notes), San Juan swingquotes were unable to derive any support from it, ranging from flat toslightly lower.

There was a consensus that today’s swing quotes for the weekendare going to be “dismal,” as one source expressed it. AHouston-based producer expects some rebound in prices after theholiday but thinks they basically “will continue to be led aroundby the screen.” But an Eastern marketer looks for the post-holidaymarket to enter a consolidation phase, predicting “we’ll test newlows before getting higher towards the end of June.”

A number of Canadian traders are looking forward to their secondstraight long holiday weekend. A couple of Calgary sources notedthat in addition to last Monday’s Victoria Day, they also will beoff for Memorial Day. After all, as one observed, “We figure thegas market will be extremely quiet with all the Americans out.”

This market has been so boring recently, a Midwest marketersaid, that “I think we need a hurricane to get things stirred up.”Her remark was timely, because June 1 marks the official start ofthe 1999 hurricane season.

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