After a strong opening yesterday, gas futures were hit with awave of selling, pressuring the market down to a $2.19 midday low.From there the February contract limped mostly sideways until alate, short-covering rally trimmed losses into the close. Theprompt month finished at $2.244, down 1.6 cents for the day.

Although the late surge made Wednesday’s activity easier toswallow for bulls, the market’s inability to fill in last week’schart gap up to $2.305 left a decidedly poor taste in technicians’mouths. Since gapping more than a dime lower on Tuesday Jan. 4, theFebruary contract steadily chipped away at those losses during thelast six trading sessions and did so during a period marked bymostly bearish fundamental news.

Bearish fundamentals may have been bolstered yesterday afternoonby the latest storage data. According to the American GasAssociation, a scant 115 Bcf was withdrawn from underground storagefacilities last week, 18 Bcf less than the prior week’s report andless than half the 233 Bcf seen a year ago. Storage is now just 90Bcf short of last year’s record levels and 257 Bcf above thesix-year average.

Despite that news, futures were up in last night’s Accesstrading session. By 7 p.m. EST the February contract was 4.1 centshigher to match the daily high at $2.285.

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