After plunging almost a dime lower in response to alarger-than-expected storage injection Wednesday afternoon, thefutures market shuffled sideways yesterday in ahurricane-abbreviated trading session. Traders were unable to gleanmuch fundamentally positive out of a natural gas market that isfaced with mild temperatures and little or no hurricane activity inthe wake of Floyd. The October contract finished at $2.546, down8.2-cents from Wednesday’s close.

Trading was suspended on the New York Mercantile Exchangeyesterday at 1:00 p.m. EDT because of expected high winds andflooding associated with Hurricane Floyd. After-hours Accesstrading was to proceed as usual, a Nymex spokesperson said.

“What we saw today was verification of the move lower inAccess,” commented a Houston-based risk manager. “Last Thursday,the market moved higher and received no follow-through, but moveslower this week in either the [Over the Counter] market or Accessmarket have been verified by trading in the regular outcry session.As a result, people are becoming more and more comfortable sellingthe run-ups,” he continued. Futures selling by commercial traderswho are long physical supply was also cited as a contributingfactor to this week’s declines.

Sources also said there were four large buyers of Louisianasupply for the purpose of storage. And at index minus 45, who canblame them, a marketer asked. Although he believes those storagebuyers once again will be out in the market today, he thinks theywill try to ratchet the price down a little bit. “[Thursday] theywere willing buyers in the $2.45-48 area, but I think they will tryto hold out for the $2.42-46 level [Friday],” he said.

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