futures

Without much in the way of fresh fundamental news, natural gasfutures limped lazily lower during the regular open-outcry sessionyesterday after an early foray to the $7.85 level failed to attractadditional buying. With that, the January contract notched itsthird down-day in a row, closing 12.4 cents lower at $7.413.Estimated volume of just 51,593 was evidence of a price move thatlacked conviction, traders observed.

With record high spot and futures prices last week, continuedcold weather and bullish supply and demand projections, LehmanBrothers didn’t pick a bad week to raise its Henry Hub priceforecasts by about 20% for both 2001 and 2002.

Two basis swap contracts based on NGI’s bidweek indexes atChicago and the Southern California border were among a number ofenergy products approved last week for listing on enymex, the NewYork Mercantile Exchange’s Internet-based trading system. Nymexexpects to launch the new system during the second quarter of 2001.

In light of last Thursday’s 47-cent downward futures correctionand new winter forecasts by the National Weather Service,PaineWebber may have jumped the gun a bit in raising its Henry Hubprice projections late last week by about 15 cents for this yearand next to $3.90 and $3.95, respectively. But the investment firmalready was playing catch-up to Salomon Smith Barney (SSB) and therest of the bullish bunch on Wall Street.

In light of yesterday’s 47-cent downward futures correction,PaineWebber may have jumped the gun a bit in raising its Henry Hubprice projections yesterday by about 15 cents for this year andnext to $3.90 and $3.95, respectively. But the investment firmalready is playing catch-up to Salomon Smith Barney (SSB) and therest of the bullish bunch on Wall Street.

With little in the way of fresh news on either the fundamentalor technical front, natural gas futures were left to limp lazilysideways Friday within a fairly tight 14.5-cent range. At theclosing bell, the December contract finished right about in themiddle, narrowly eking out at 1.1-cent gain to finish at $5.456.Activity was light as some traders observed the Veteran’s Dayholiday.

Natural gas futures finished the week on a strong note Friday astraders reacted to an unconfirmed (and later retracted) news reportthat the American Gas Association (AGA) had overestimated theamount of working gas in underground storage facilities. Aftergapping higher on the open, the December contract shuffled higherthroughout much of the session, closing 17.1 cents higher at$4.931.

After gapping lower on the opening bell, natural gas futuressifted lower Friday as traders continued the sell-off that begantwo and a half weeks ago. With Friday’s $4.541 settlement, theNovember contract concluded its tenure as prompt month on adecidedly negative note, down 12.3 cents on the day and $1.24 offits Oct. 12 high-water mark.

With little in the way of fresh fundamental news, natural gasfutures traded mostly sideways yesterday as traders rested after atumultuous 10 days of trading activity. A modest gain in the promptmonth was more than offset by losses in each of the out months.November finished up 0.5 cents at $4.664 while the 12-month stripclosed 1.6 cents lower at $4.313.