Demotes

Amid a steady stream of non-commercial selling, natural gasfutures tumbled lower yesterday morning, renewing fears that themarket may not have reached a bottom and further losses arepossible. Plunging to its lowest level in more than three months,the April contract took the selling on the chin yesterday, falling15.7 cents to close at $5.006. Volume at Nymex was healthy with anestimated 56,626 contracts changing hands.

To say the weekly storage report has had an impact on thenatural gas futures market lately would be a gross understatement.Following an impressive 69 Bcf injection on Sept. 1, the futuresmarket dropped 26.6 cents the very next day. Then a week later,following the release of a relatively small 66 Bcf refill, themarket took a wild, 24-cent ride higher to close the session in themid-$2.80s. Now, a week later the question that everyone is askingis whether we will see another big move today. At first glance theanswer to that question was a resounding “yes” because shortlyafter the storage figures were released the October contracttumbled a dime lower in after-hours Access trading.