Weekend price drops were large in the West but fairly moderate at eastern and Permian/Waha points. Declines were in double digits Friday in the Rockies/San Juan/Pacific Northwest and in triple digits at all California points except Malin (which was nearly a dollar lower) as a West Coast heat wave receded and PG&E issued another OFO (see Transportation Notes). But in the East quotes tended to range from flat to down about a dime, and scattered points registered tiny gains.

It’s still too cool in the Northeast for good market load, a marketer said. He noted that only a few Northeast citygate quotes exceeded $4 and that most regional averages were in the $3.90s for the first time since late July 200. “It’s about time for the politicians to quit screaming about high gas prices,” the marketer said. “They’re not that high any more.”

For a Gulf Coast trader, the “big phenomenon” Friday was the size of the spread between cash and the screen. July futures didn’t vary very far to either side of flat, which meant Henry Hub was running about 20-22 cents back of that level throughout the morning. “I haven’t seen that happen since March,” he exclaimed. The power generation market is almost non-existent from Pennsylvania north, the trader added, and there’s not much urgency in storage buying any more. He was rather surprised not to see any OFOs on eastern pipes, saying, “I think there will be a mismatch in weekend supplies, and pipes will be ordering surplus gas off their systems as traders return to the office Monday.”

However, a Gulf Coast producer said prices were moving higher in late activity, and he attributed it to emerging storage demand. It seemed like storage buyers hung back for a while, then decided the lower early prices were attractive enough to pad their accounts a bit more, he said.

“These numbers are looking like the old days,” said a western marketer who averaged around $3.20 at Malin and only about a dime higher at the PG&E citygate. Gate quotes ranged as low as $2.75 in highly volatile trading as the utility made it four weekends in a row that have begun with a high-linepack OFO. “It wasn’t much of a surprise to anyone that they [PG&E] were going to call the OFO,” the marketer said. He marveled that “PG&E-Topock traded under the Permian today, and not by just pennies but by dimes.”

Although SoCalGas did not renew Friday’s Overnominations Day notice, border numbers into the LDC fell by more than $2.

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