Natural gas futures traded either side of even in the early morning hours Tuesday as the market weighed near-term warmth against the potential for frigid temperatures to dip into the Lower 48 to kick off 2022. 

NGI Morning Natural Gas Price & Markets Coverage

After dropping as low as $3.719/MMBtu in after hours trading, the January Nymex contract was up 3.8 cents to $3.872/MMBtu at around 8:45 a.m. ET.

Both the American and European weather models trended warmer overnight by showing milder conditions over northern portions of the country for this weekend through next week, according to NatGasWeather.

However, the models “both continue to forecast a rather chilly U.S. pattern Jan. 1-5,” the firm said. 

This is especially the case for the European dataset, which came in colder than its American counterpart for this...