Natural gas futures were in freefall early Thursday as overnight guidance further weakened the amount of potential cold expected to arrive later this month. After dropping 10.0 cents in Wednesday’s trading, the January Nymex contract was down another 16.3 cents to $2.617/MMBtu at around 8:50 a.m. ET.

NGI Morning Natural Gas Price & Markets Coverage

Coming off of milder trends for the Dec. 12-16 period in the midday model runs Wednesday, the American and European datasets extended warmer trends for this time frame overnight, according to NatGasWeather.

“The weather data was already bearish” for this week through around Dec. 12, making the mid-December time frame “the next best chance for colder systems to finally arrive,” the firm said. “And after backing off further overnight, the natural gas markets are yet again...