Consecutive

Despite trading within a slim 10-cent range, May natural gas futures on Friday knocked on the $11 door for a second consecutive session, only to be rebuffed once again. The prompt-month contract traded between $10.875 and $10.970 before closing out the day at $10.963, up 17.3 cents from Thursday and 37.6 cents higher than the previous week’s finish.

Natural gas futures values took their second consecutive session beating on Monday as Wall Street investment bank concerns dominated the chatter among traders. April natural gas dropped 76.8 cents Monday to close at $9.100, while April crude shrank by $4.53 to close at $105.68/bbl.

With temperatures remaining frigid Tuesday in a number of regions of the country, including the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast, March natural gas futures for a second consecutive day reached a high of $8.620, which much like Monday’s session ended up triggering a round of selling. The prompt-month contract on Tuesday closed at $8.436, down 9.5 cents on the day.

Putting together the second consecutive regular session of gains, natural gas futures traders on Tuesday once again discarded a mound of bearish fundamentals in exchange for changing weather forecasts, which are now calling for February to be not as warm as first expected. March natural gas futures recorded a high of $8.005 before closing out the day at $7.942, up 7.3 cents from Monday’s finish.

Prompt-month natural gas futures shot exactly 18.1 cents higher for a second consecutive session Friday as traders and analysts debated without consensus the reasoning for the renewed bout of strength. After reaching a high of $7.985, the February natural gas contract — which expires Tuesday — closed out the day at $7.983, just a penny short of the previous Friday’s finish.

While the Northeast continued to bask in spring-like 60- to 70-degree temperatures in January for a second consecutive session, natural gas futures traders inexplicably continued to pressure upside resistance at $8. The February contract touched that level briefly before finishing out Tuesday at $7.967, up 8.8 cents from Monday’s finish.

The New York Mercantile Exchange Inc. (Nymex) said it plans to expand the listing of consecutive contract months for its natural gas (NG), natural gas swap (NN), and natural gas penultimate swap (NP) futures contracts to the current year plus the next 12 years through December 2020. The contracts are currently listed for the current contract year plus five additional years. “Nymex is providing market participants with unprecedented risk management opportunities,” said Nymex CEO James E. Newsome. “No other energy exchange gives their customers the ability to trade so far out on the curve. We are gratified to provide innovative solutions to help the industry hedge its risk more than a decade into the future.”

January natural gas futures settled lower for a sixth consecutive regular session on Tuesday as isolated near-term cold would appear to be no match for warmer-than-normal winter temperature forecasts, more than comfortable natural gas storage levels and significant weakness in neighboring crude futures. January natural gas reached a low of $7.080 before closing Tuesday at $7.155, down 5.9 cents from Monday.

December natural gas futures pushed north of $8 for a third consecutive session on Wednesday but failed to capture the gains once again. The contract finished out the session at $7.835, down 11.4 cents from Tuesday.