Despite cold weather in several areas following a weekend blizzard on the East Coast that normally would be expected to prop up spot prices, the cash market softened at nearly all points Monday. It was a case of just not cold enough in enough areas, along with the screen’s slide last week that got extended into a sixth day and high comfort levels with storage inventories, one source said.

With the blizzard that dumped more than two feet of snow on parts of the Northeast Sunday having been relegated to past tense, Northeast citygates led the overall downward trek. Losses ranged from 2-3 cents to about 75 cents, with Transco Zone 6-New York City taking the biggest hit. That seemed a bit ironic since the storm had left just shy of 27 inches of snow in the city’s Central Park, which was the all-time high for a single storm since record-keeping began in 1869.

A few flat to a nickel or so higher points prevented an across the board bearish sweep.

The Florida citygate was one of the rare rising points — and the only one still maintaining a small premium to its first-of-month index — after Florida Gas Transmission issued an OFO-like notice Sunday and tightened its imbalance tolerance Monday (see Transportation Notes). Florida Gas Zone 3 in the producing area only saw a small loss, but Florida Gas Zone 2 fell nearly 40 cents.

Most of the smallest declines and the few flat to slightly firmer points were recorded in the West, where the northern half of the region is due to get a fresh invasion of polar air Tuesday, according to The Weather Channel (TWC). However, highs in the 80s were predicted for the desert Southwest. The Northeast is expected to see seasonable temperatures again, and light snows in the Midwest are likely to limit any significant accumulations, TWC said. Meanwhile, the South should get a wide range of thermometer readings, with freeze warnings in Florida and well below seasonal temperatures in much of the region’s east end yielding to well above seasonal temperatures west of the Mississippi River.

A Northeast marketer said the corridor from Philadelphia through New England got the biggest snow volumes from the blizzard, but the impact tended to get significantly lighter north of Boston. Even with their plunges, Northeast citygates maintained a basis spread of more than a dollar from Henry Hub, he pointed out.

The Northeast will be warming up a bit through Thursday, and likely will be getting rain instead of snow around that time, the marketer went on. But then Saturday “will begin probably the coldest seven-to-10-day span of the winter so far, he said. Transportation remains wide open, he added, calling it “amazing” that the pipelines have issued so few OFOs this winter.

Citigroup analyst Kyle Cooper updated his estimation of the upcoming storage report to call for a draw near 100 Bcf, “with a bias to slightly larger.”

©Copyright 2006Intelligence Press Inc. All rights reserved. The preceding news reportmay not be republished or redistributed, in whole or in part, in anyform, without prior written consent of Intelligence Press, Inc.