The cash market appeared to be entering a holding stage Wednesday as moderate upticks earlier in the week yielded to a mix of flat, slightly higher and slightly lower pricing that tended to be dominated by mild gains. The slowdown in price movement largely was attributed to cool-downs in the Northeast and Midwest market areas, reducing the air conditioning load that had supported the previous advances.

Sources were unsure about calling the upcoming market direction. Some thought AGA’s latest report of a large storage injection (110 Bcf), coupled with the diminution of cooling load in key market areas, should be bearish enough to get prices rolling downhill again today. But others pointed to the screen’s eventual nickel-plus rise after the storage report, following vacillation to either side of flat, as a positive sign for cash, although they admitted that most of the futures firmness likely was due to technical short-covering of positions.

A Gulf Coast trader saw another reason for modest bullishness. Despite moderating northern temperatures, power generation load is still very strong in the South and West, he said. “We’ve still got enough weather to keep cash up for a while longer.”

But a Northeast-oriented marketer said area citygates were falling as the morning proceeded. “I saw utilities and power generators selling Z6 [Transco Zone 6] heavily, and that’s a good recipe for softness,” he said.

The California border-SoCalGas repeated as the contrarian in the overall market, chalking up a loss of more than 80 cents. Rockies/Pacific Northwest points achieved some of Wednesday’s larger gains on either side of a dime, however, as inland western areas continued to sizzle. A marketer noted that Sumas and Northwest-domestic are now trading at near parity, and that their once-huge spread began narrowing immediately after the pipeline lifted its must-flow OFO at the beginning of July. “Kemmerer [Station in Wyoming] isn’t even constrained any more,” he laughed.

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