Unified price movement returned to the cash market Thursday for only the second time in about two months. And like the trading date of June 8 (see Daily GPI, June 11), the direction was down. Dwindling cooling load in northern market areas and negative futures guidance from the previous day resulted in double-digit drops across the board.

Northeast citygates, where high temperatures will range from the mid 70s to the mid 80s Friday, saw most of the largest declines that overall ranged from about 20 cents to about 55 cents.

Even with declines of 20-35 cents or so Thursday, the Rockies is the only market still trading at premiums to first-of-month indexes. All other points are at least a dime below index, and nearly all of them are seeing deficits of 40 cents or more.

Odds are heavily against any chance of a rally Friday. Cold fronts, often bearing cooling rains, will be limiting peak temperatures through the weekend in many sections of the South, Northeast and Midwest. And the Pacific Northwest is cooling off again after having the unusual experience of approaching 100 degrees as recently as Wednesday. Screen weakness Thursday and the normal weekend decline of industrial demand are other bearish factors for Friday’s market.

August futures fell a little more than a dime Thursday after the Energy Information Administration said 106 Bcf was added to storage in the week ending July 6. That was well above consensus expectations in the mid 90s Bcf. In a sense, though, the report could be perceived as being in line with prior estimates because 10 Bcf of the injection consisted of a reclassification of cushion gas to working gas (see futures story).

Florida Gas Zones 2 and 3 were down about 40 cents and 35 cents, respectively, even though Florida Gas Transmission extended an Overage Alert Day into at least its sixth day Thursday. However, the alert was believed likely to end Friday after thunderstorms cooled off several sections of the Sunshine State Thursday.

It’s safe to say there won’t be any rebound in the cash market Friday, a Northeast marketer said, adding that the storage number “put a firm lid on any possible Nymex rally.” There is no sign of any major heat in the Northeast during the next two weeks, “and that takes us nearly to the end of July,” he said. The marketer acknowledged that the region will get warmer again next week but said it will not be for the sustained length of very high temperatures need to send prices higher. All in all it was a “ho-hum spring [for the market] and now it’s a ho-hum summer,” he said.

Basis spreads from the Gulf Coast to the Northeast have been working so far this week, he went on, but they could collapse enough Friday to make transport unprofitable. As recently as Tuesday the Algonquin citygate was trading a little more than a dollar above Henry Hub, he said, and “long-haul shippers love those kind of numbers.”

A marketer said there was no secret about why prices saw hefty declines in the Upper Midwest. Area weather was very good, cool and dry with a high in the low 70s Thursday, she said. “Works for me,” she laughed. Her company didn’t buy any spot gas Thursday, but it likely will make some purchases Friday for a few customers wanting to add to their storage accounts. The company expects Michigan citygates to be even lower than Thursday’s averages around $6.40, she said.

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