Fair

Thursday’s market had a little something for everybody: large gains and losses coupled with small gains and losses, with a fair amount of flat pricing to boot. Moderating weather trends going into the weekend (except in much of the West) and the inclusion of a weekend flow day in Thursday’s trading competed with Wednesday’s 5.2-cent expiration-day gain by July futures for influence in the cash market.

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin asked state legislators for a redo Friday, as she delivered a revamped natural gas pipeline bill that she said was “fair, transparent and competitive.”

El Paso Natural Gas and the Navajo Nation signed an interim agreement Friday that ends a months-long stalemate over the fair dollar value of the gas pipeline’s access to tribal lands in western states.

Cash quotes fell Thursday at most points as expected, but the market displayed more resilience than some had anticipated by including a fair-sized number of flat (or a little higher in a couple of cases) locations in its overall mix.

The cash market was up strongly at all points Monday, responding to a fair amount of current heating load and the prospect of a lot more arriving before the end of the week. The return of normal industrial demand from the weekend also played a part, and a Monday morning screen spike provided some upward impetus for late cash deals, although natural gas futures later gave back much of its morning gain.

Both California and Mexico are committed to giving proponents of liquefied natural gas (LNG) import projects a chance to make their cases for new receiving terminals, but it is still unclear how many and where (on-land or offshore) those facilities will be built, according to government energy officials who spoke this week at a conference in Long Beach, CA.

As the battle rages on over shutting in natural gas wells for the purpose of preserving crude bitumen recovery from the Wabiskaw-McMurray formation located in northern Alberta, province regulators revised downward the number of gas wells they believe should be closed.

On Friday and Monday the cash market had a fair amount of higher points mixed into an overall falling trend. But continuing weak fundamentals finally united the entire market in southward movement Tuesday, although just barely in one or two cases.

As expected, follow-through buying took natural gas prices higher Tuesday morning as more buyers jumped on the bandwagon following a two-day, 40-cent gain. However, all good things must come to an end and prices tumbled lower Tuesday afternoon amid a round of light profit taking. December finished at $4.261, down 0.2 cents for the day and in the bottom half of its $4.215-335 trading range. Estimated volume was relatively heavy, with 95,767 contracts changing hands.