Reported Gulf of Mexico shut-ins were up a little Friday, but the continuing production losses from Hurricane Ivan no longer had any price-boosting influence. Instead, quotes fell across the board (although Columbia Gas’ loss of a penny or two was essentially flat) as weather-related load remained elusive and the usual weekend loss of industrial demand added its depressant effect.

Declines ranged from about a dime to nearly 35 cents, with those around 20 cents or more in a slight majority. Western points were solidly among those with the bigger losses due to the double whammy of high-linepack OFOs in effect Saturday on both the SoCalGas and PG&E systems (see Transportation Notes).

Tropical Storm Ivan had only a small additional impact on offshore supplies in its second trek through the Gulf of Mexico production area. It was downgraded to a tropical depression immediately after going ashore in the southwest corner of Louisiana around 9 p.m. CDT Thursday and the National Hurricane Center subsequently ended further discussion of the storm.

However, Ivan hindered the ongoing restoration of shut-in gas flows, as the Minerals Management Service said that 11 days after the first shut-ins were recorded, 21 companies reported 2,356.43 MMcf/d offline as of 11:30 a.m. CDT Friday. That actually was an increase of about 26 MMcf/d from Thursday, when all platform evacuations were in MMS’ New Orleans District area. But the agency said Friday it had gotten a report regarding Ivan in which six platforms in the Lake Charles District with a total shut-in output of 49 MMcf/d had been evacuated. The cumulative supply shortfall from Sept. 13 through Friday rose to 43.304 Bcf, or 0.973% of the Gulf’s approximate yearly production of 4.45 Tcf, MMS said.

A trader of the intrastate Texas market noted that forecasts of mid 80s highs in Houston from Friday through Tuesday was a definite clue that air conditioning load in Texas is less than normal. With Ivan having gone off the market’s radar screen so quickly, he perceived Friday as a pretty quiet and much softer trading day. A lot of people seemed to be going home early that afternoon despite the lack of a holiday weekend, he said.

Prices were down from the start and trended even lower as the morning went on, a Calgary-based source said. But despite the pervasive softening, he found “a lot of buyers out there,” which he attributed to the amount of gas stranded on several Gulf Coast pipes. A Northern Border maintenance restriction was still in effect Friday but supposed to be ended for the weekend, he noted, saying, “At least we traded Chicago citygates” under the expectation of no Northern Border constraint.

Natural gas futures continued their slide, falling a little more than 17 cents. There obviously was a disconnect with Nymex’s oil-related offerings, which all rose as crude oil for November added another 42 cents to post its highest ever daily settlement of $48.88/bbl. That was 18 cents above the previous record close on Aug. 19, but still below the intra-day peak of $49.40 posted on Aug. 20.

Probably due to beginning on a Friday, bidweek was a unsurprisingly slow starter, according to one marketer. “I didn’t really get any [October deals] going today,” he said, adding that he expected most bidweek trading to be done this week when traders will have fresher weather data with which to work.

However, a producer reported seeing quite a bit of Chicago citygate action Friday. Deliveries into the Nicor system were priced early in the low $5.50s, but most business was done later on either side of $5.40, reflecting the screen weakness. The $5.40 area represents an increase of about 20 cents from September’s $5.20 Chicago index. Chicago and Northern Natural-demarc were among the few points that were fairly heavily traded for October Friday, the producer noted.

A Texas-based marketer quoted these other fixed prices from Friday trading: ANR Southwest, $4.90 to low $5.00s; NGPL Midcontinent, high $4.80s to mid $4.90s; Panhandle Eastern, mid $4.80s to around $5.00; demarc, low $4.90s to around $5.10; and Waha, high 4.70s. Ranges tended to be wide in some cases because of major screen weakness, she said.

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