As a couple of sources had expected Friday, that day’s record-setting action in crude oil futures paved the way for a general cash gas rally Monday, even though the natural gas screen had fallen more than 8 cents going into the weekend. The return of industrial load from a weekend slump, moderately cooler weather in northern market areas to start the week and continued storage injection demand also played a part in Monday’s overall bullishness.

However, the gains were fairly moderate for the most part in being capped at a little more than 35 cents (less than most of Friday’s losses) and with few exceeding 20 cents. In addition, a number of points that were flat to as much as about 15 cents lower indicated that parts of the market were still struggling with fundamental weakness.

Future cash advances Tuesday were considered unlikely after Nymex’s entire energy futures complex took it on the chin Monday. The May natural gas contract began its three-day countdown to settlement with a loss of 42.8 cents, while June crude oil was leading its heating oil and unleaded gasoline brethren much lower with a dive of nearly $2 to $73.33/bbl after having touched an intraday record of $75.40 early in the session.

Up to a half-foor of snow was in the forecast for parts of the Upper Plains Tuesday as a cold front moves in, and highs in the 40s were due in the Great Lakes region, but the rest of the Midwest could expect reasonably moderate late-April weather. And a cool beginning to the week helped generate double-digit gains at Northeast citygates. However, highs in the 70s and even a few 80s were predicted for the Mid-Atlantic.

Summer-like conditions kept air conditioners humming across the South again Monday, but that won’t last much longer. A strong cold front will be dropping temperatures by as much as 20 degrees across the Lower Plains and Midcontinent Tuesday, according to The Weather Channel, and the front will proceed to have a similar effect in the South Wednesday.

After a pleasant weekend, thermometer levels were dropping precipitously in much of the West Monday. Denver’s high around 80 degrees Sunday would be reduced to the 30s Monday, TWC said, and winter storm warnings were posted for parts of the Rockies. However, mild conditions are expected to prevail along the West Coast and into the Southwest.

A PG&E low-inventory OFO (see Transportation Notes) had relatively little market impact, with the PG&E citygate rising a little more than a dime while Malin was limited to a gain of less than a nickel.

Despite PG&E’s OFO being for low inventory, a western marketer said he could see the OFO coming and avoided any problems by backing off Malin deliveries. He was a little puzzled about the need for the OFO, saying snow in the relatively sparsely populated Sierra Mountains area of Northern California should have been much of a load driver. He speculated that maybe traders were diverting more gas than usual off PG&E’s system into storage and taking linepack lower.

The marketer remarked that Rockies prices have made “a pretty good comeback” from their slump earlier this month.

Largely as a function of screen weakness, May baseload prices were moving lower as bidweek got under way Monday, he continued. The marketer reported trading Sumas basis at basis of minus $1.66, and said fixed prices at Sumas in the low to mid $6.10s Monday morning had dwindled to less than $6 that afternoon. He also said index deals for Malin had started at flat to half a penny premium, but by Monday afternoon were running at a discount of almost 2 cents from index.

A utility buyer in the South said his company still likes current pricing, “but only relative to outer [Nymex strip] months. He plans to buy some May baseload gas to put into storage, but expects small current-burn demand during May. Summer term deals will cover most of the utility’s commercial/industrial load, which tends to remain fairly steady during a shoulder month like May, he said.

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