Natural gas futures were nearly unchanged in early trading Thursday as the market awaited more clues on the supply/demand balance, expected from the upcoming release of U.S. government inventory data. The September Nymex contract was up 0.1 cents to $2.427/MMBtu at around 8:45 a.m. ET.

AM markets

For today’s Energy Information Administration (EIA) report, scheduled for 10:30 a.m. ET, analysts have been predicting a build in the 40s Bcf range. 

A Bloomberg survey of eight analysts showed injection estimates ranging from 36 Bcf to 48 Bcf, with a median build of 43 Bcf. A Reuters poll had a wider range from 33-53 Bcf with the same median build expectation of 43 Bcf. NGI’s storage model predicted a 46 Bcf injection for this week’s report, which covers the week ending Aug. 14.

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