As anticipated, the previous day’s futures plunge of nearly 30 cents was reflected by overall softness in Tuesday’s cash market. But there was enough hot weather demand to distribute pockets of flat to higher prices here and there.

Declines were generally moderate at a little more than a dime or less, although Panhandle Eastern broke the pattern with a 20-cent drop. On the other hand, a couple of other Midcontinent pipes (ANR and NGPL) recorded gains of about a dime, while scattered other points — primarily in the West — ranged from flat to up about a nickel.

One East Coast source had “no big feeling one way or the other” on which way prices will go Wednesday. She noted that subnormal temperatures in the key Northeast and Midwest market areas will work against the screen’s modest rally of slightly less than a nickel Tuesday.

The West appears to have the best chance of a full-scale rebound Wednesday with searing temperatures in the desert Southwest complemented by above normal heat in the Rockies and Pacific Northwest. And despite relatively mild conditions in the Midwest and Northeast, the East isn’t without its torrid areas. As The Weather Channel put it, “Summer will be in its full, hot glory in the South tomorrow [Wednesday] with maximum temperatures soaring well into the 90s almost everywhere, and probably topping 100 here and there in Texas.”

Although the Northeast should remain unusually cool for a bit longer, the Midwest and Plains areas are expected to begin warming up as early as Wednesday.

Permian/Waha gas was feeling the power generation load tug from both east and west — intrastate Texas and the Southwest — pushing prices up about a nickel in that market.

A Northeast marketer lamented that it was “rainy and mild in the 70s here, and that doesn’t do much towards keeping gas loads up.” Noting how predictions last week had called for above normal temperatures in the region this week, she joked, “Maybe I should quit this job and become a weather forecaster. There’s so little load in the market area currently that transport on some pipes from the Gulf Coast isn’t working; that is, the spreads don’t cover variable costs, she said.

The National Weather Service’s forecast for the July 19-23 workweek indicates above normal temperatures in Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, and also in a Southwest area encompassing all of California and part of the Rockies and extending into North Texas. Below normal temperatures are expected in most of the U.S. east of the Mississippi River and north of a line along the southern border of Washington state extending to the northwest corner of North Dakota.

Analyst Kyle Cooper of Citigroup said his final estimation for the upcoming storage report looks for a build between 97 and 107 Bcf. “A build in our range will continue to reinforce an outlook that the supply/demand balance is not tight in the least bit, and is actually a bit loose,” he added.

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