Helps

Using its back-to-basics approach, and a little help from good weather, CMS Energy reported Thursday that it managed to improve earnings in the first quarter, reaching $79 million (51 cents a share) compared with last year’s quarterly earnings of $42 million (32 cents).

The Minerals Management Service’s (MMS) royalty relief incentive to drill for deep-gas deposits located in the shallow-water shelf area of the Gulf of Mexico drew a hoard of bidders in Central Gulf Lease Sale 185. The shallow waters of the Gulf (0-199 meters) received by far the most bids in the sale: 374 bids on 1.7 million acres/hectares for $237.8 million.

The Minerals Management Service’s (MMS) royalty relief incentive to drill for deep-gas deposits located in the shallow-water shelf area of the Gulf of Mexico drew a hoard of bidders in Central Gulf Lease Sale 185. The shallow waters of the Gulf (0-199 meters) received by far the most bids in the sale: 374 bids on 1.7 million acres/hectares for $237.8 million.

The 10-cent spike in March futures in the face of softer holiday weekend demand at most locations was enough to help cash prices manage gains of about a nickel on average and much more in the Northeast, which was expecting severe cold on Saturday and Sunday.

November spot prices moved higher (up 8-14 cents at most locations) Friday for weekend deliveries in response to the late run-up in Nymex futures on Thursday and the cooler temperatures expected through the weekend.

Surprising more than one trader, the cash market didn’t follow its usual recent pattern of following Tuesday’s screen dive on the following day. Instead, cash was flat to up 50 cents in most cases Wednesday. Most gains were in single digits.

Technical factors, short-covering — and oh yeah, a tad of returning cold weather fundamentals — were the most plausible reasons sources could cite for mostly higher weekend prices, despite the usual demand slump for such a trading period. Friday’s firmness was fairly moderate with nearly all points ranging from flat to nearly a dime up; most gains were about a nickel or less.

Many observers have been scratching their heads lately over the inability of the futures and cash markets to show significant declines despite overwhelming fundamental reasons to do so. There’s been very little cold weather to speak of this heating season and gas storage levels are at record highs with 37% more gas in storage than at the same time last year, yet January gas futures remained in the mid $2.60s on Tuesday, down only 2.9 cents on the day to $2.657.

Flatness dominated the cash market Wednesday as most points showed little price movement and the remaining small increases and decreases tended to cancel each other out. If anything, however, there was a slight bias to the downside. Most of the upticks were in the West, while Gulf Coast and Northeast points saw more of the larger downticks.