Mild December Forecast Turns Colder as Natural Gas Futures Pare Losses Early

Colder-trending forecasts — albeit with truly impressive winter conditions still absent from the December outlook — helped natural gas futures recover some of their recent losses early Tuesday.

The January Nymex contract was up 5.9 cents to $2.753/MMBtu at around 8:48 a.m. ET. February was up 5.4 cents to $2.705.

Heading into Tuesday’s session, weather models had trended notably colder over the prior 24 hours, including an overnight increase of 13 heating degree days from the American dataset, according to NatGasWeather.

“But despite the weather data trending colder over the past 24 hours, it remains quite bearish for most of the next 15 days,” the firm said. “In addition, the U.S. pattern at Dec. 18-20 is more bearish than it was in prior days due to less frosty...