Natural gas futures continued to lose ground early Thursday as milder-trending forecasts did little to repair the damage dealt by a material weakening in export demand expectations heading into next year.

After plunging 14.1 cents on Wednesday, the January Nymex contract was down another 3.2 cents to $2.537/MMBtu at around 8:30 a.m. ET.

Futures sold off sharply Wednesday following an update from ExxonMobil that pushed back the expected completion of its Golden Pass LNG terminal to late 2024, with first exports now expected in 2025.

“This is six months later than we had expected and likely a driver of the commodity underperformance” Wednesday, analysts at Tudor, Pickering, Holt & Co. (TPH) said in a note Thursday. “After following up with the company, we have now modeled...