Weather-related production declines and signs of chillier temperatures later this month helped natural gas futures traders shrug off bearish inventory data to send prices higher early Friday. The February Nymex contract was up 8.9 cents to $3.901/MMBtu shortly before 9 a.m. ET.

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The latest weather data heading into Friday’s session was trending toward “colder risks” for the final third of January, according to Bespoke Weather Services. This trend was shown “most aggressively” in the American modeling but was also “hinted at” by the European dataset, the firm said.

“This risk, along with production remaining low due to recent freeze-offs, continues to support the market against higher storage levels and weak cash prices,” Bespoke said. “The battle between these...