Except for isolated upticks in the Northern California market and only mild softness at Pacific Northwest points, prices for last-of-May flow fell by about 15 cents or more Wednesday. A negative screen during the morning provided no support for cash traders, and weather fundamentals are still too mild to create substantial air conditioning load, sources said.

AGA came just a tad short of reporting a fifth straight weekly storage refill of 100 Bcf or more, saying 99 Bcf was injected last week. That fell within the range of many prior expectations, but Nymex traders treated it as just about the most bullish development they had seen in quite a while. After selling the July contract lower during the morning, they reversed gears that afternoon to send the contract to an eventual gain on the day of just over 17 cents.

One staffer at a large aggregator said, “We had been expecting 120 [Bcf] from AGA, so the Nymex turnaround on Nymex seemed justified to us.” A Calgary source noted that prices in the intra-Alberta market, which trades all day, were in rebound mode along with the screen in the afternoon. “This is a short-covering rally that some people said we needed, but I don’t know,” he added. “Who are you going to believe, the screen or the [soft] fundamentals you can see?”

Several traders reported that the screen uptick gave an afternoon lift to late-bidweek prices in several areas, but the overall effect would be subdued since only a little June business remained to be completed by that point. A western buyer said he had been buying San Juan-Blanco gas in the $3.10s prior to the holiday weekend, but was getting prices bracketing $2.90 this week.

An industrial end-user said he was glad to see June prices falling so far, but thought the big futures run-up Wednesday afternoon “seemed kind of ominous.” Since several of his plants were to undergo annual maintenance turnarounds lasting about a week or so at various times during the month, he eschewed any baseload purchases in favor of playing the swing game.

Looking a bit further out, a Gulf Coast marketer expects the June aftermarket to be quiet and generally weak for a while, but then to start strengthening by mid-month. “After all, we’re way past due to start breaking some sweats here in the South,” he said.

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