The cash market was able to sustain mostly moderate price increases through a second day Thursday, but may be hard pressed to score a hat trick Friday after major retreats in Nymex’s energy futures complex. The gas screen fell nearly 20 cents in response to a government report showing that net storage refills were already under way last week.

Several flat showings were scattered among gains that ranged from 3-4 cents to nearly a quarter. The strongest price performances occurred in the West, where some colder weather that may inspire memories of the recently departed winter will start moving in Friday and continue through the weekend. That market area is likely to be most resistant to weekend softening.

A stormy cold front will be moving through the Rockies Friday, bringing snow to the higher elevations, according to The Weather Channel (TWC). Another more potent storm is due to hit the Pacific Northwest that day and carry its chilling properties as far south as the Four Corners area by Sunday. The Rockies and high Plains regions will turn sharply colder during the weekend, and Denver could get some springtime snow by Sunday, TWC said.

The Energy Information Administration signaled that the industry indeed had gotten a head start on the traditional injection season by reporting a 10 Bcf injection for the week ending April 1 — no fooling! While not totally unexpected (Citigroup’s Kyle Cooper had estimated a range from plus 5 Bcf to minus 5 Bcf), the report confounded consensus expectations for a pull of 5-10 Bcf.

The East region was still in a net withdrawal mode by taking out 2 Bcf, EIA said. However, that was more than offset by the Producing region stashing away 11 Bcf, with the West region chipping in another 1 Bcf.

Because the comparable year-earlier injection was even larger at 15 Bcf, Thursday’s report failed to increase the year-on-year surplus. But the Nymex reaction was understandably bearish. May natural gas futures dropped in two selling waves, eventually winding up the day down 19.2 cents. Perhaps even more telling to the market were the plunges in petroleum products, with crude oil, heating oil and unleaded gasoline all taking it on the chin. Crude for May delivery plummeted $1.74 to $54.11/bbl, reportedly due to more Saudi Arabian promises of stepped-up production.

A couple of sources turned analytical about the market in general following the big futures drops. Even though he markets gas for a producer, one said he hoped that Nymex prices keep going down and that cash numbers join them soon. “All producers should be hedging as much as they can right now” because these high prices can’t be sustained much longer, he added.

And a Midwest marketer said he was “wondering when these Nymex traders are going to whack themselves in the head and realize gas is way overpriced.” Maybe it was starting Thursday, he mused, adding, “At some point I’d like to think they’ll get nervous and wonder what they’re going to do” with abundant storage gas salted away. He also thinks oil prices should be collapsing sometime in the near future, but said that for now, “it’s a watch and wait game for everybody.”

Like the West, New England will be seeing some colder weather in the next couple of days, but overall Northeast temperatures will still be on the moderate side for early spring. However, one trader reported that power generation loads in New England are currently very strong with several nuclear units down, especially the giant 1,159 MW Seabrook 1 reactor in New Hampshire. “The weather doesn’t really support it, but there have been heavy power send-outs recently,” he said. The trader thought it “kind of odd” that he has seen little industrial-commercial demand decay from persistent high energy prices.

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