Natural gas prices trended mostly higher during the first day of December bidweek trading on Wednesday even as production hovered near record levels, supplies in storage remained robust and weather-driven demand proved seasonally soft.

NGI’s Bidweek Alert (BWA) showed upward momentum across several regions, with traders focused more on the winter ahead than the current benign conditions. Due to the Thanksgiving holiday, December bidweek trading spans Nov. 22 and Nov. 27-28.

For example, Michigan Consolidated basis traded around minus 26.5 cents on day 1 of December bidweek. This compared with an average of minus 49.25 cents for November bidweek.

Elsewhere in the Midwest, Defiance basis traded around minus 25.0 cents, an improvement from November bidweek’s average of minus...