Drops

Canadian natural gas exports have tapered off in a gentle decline expected to foreshadow deeper drops through 2007, when reduced drilling and increased domestic industrial consumption are forecast to keep eroding supplies.

Canadian natural gas exports have tapered off in a gentle decline expected to foreshadow deeper drops through 2007, when reduced drilling and increased domestic industrial consumption are forecast to keep eroding supplies.

Despite precipitous drops in the petroleum futures sector, natural gas future trading was fairly quiet Tuesday as traders appeared to be on the sidelines waiting for the petroleum markets to adjust to last week’s natural gas futures declines. After trading between $4.900 and $5.120, October natural gas ended up closing at $5.006, up 6.4 cents on the day.

Friday’s October aftermarket-ending trading was much like that of the day before: large price drops across the board. The difference was that declines got much larger at nearly all points. Moderating weather trends, a bearish storage report, prior-day screen weakness and the usual weekend drop in industrial load were cited as factors in the softness.

After ignoring the price drops in the petroleum futures complex almost entirely on Tuesday, October natural gas futures couldn’t look away a second day in a row. In addition to petroleum weakness, prompt month natural gas was helped lower Wednesday by positive news from the Gulf of Mexico, settling at $11.201, down 45.6 cents on the day.

Reacting to large drops in energy futures the day before and finding little support from weather-related demand, cash prices fell by double-digit amounts at all points Wednesday. The declines ranged from a little more than a dime to about 35 cents, with all but a few hitting 20 cents or more.

ConocoPhillips, the largest oil and natural gas producer on Alaska’s North Slope, has dropped out of the chief lobbying group that has been pressing Congress to open the coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) to oil and gas drilling.

With a midweek winter blast due to yield to more moderate conditions in key northern market areas, prices dropped at nearly all points Thursday by amounts ranging from a couple of pennies to a little more than 30 cents. A little more than half of the declines were a dime or less.

ConocoPhillips, the largest oil and natural gas producer on Alaska’s North Slope, has dropped out of the chief lobbying group that has been pressing Congress to open the coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) to oil and gas drilling.