Marched

Both the cash and futures marched lower Wednesday. The looming question of where the current storage surplus combined with robust production will find a home come October continues to pressure the market. Futures slipped below $2, establishing a new 10-year low. Most markets were off by about a nickel, and Northeast points hovered in the vicinity of unchanged.

Oil- and liquids-rich natural gas plays marched to the forefront of drilling activity in the past year with the Niobrara, Eagle Ford and Bakken leading a 38% increase in active rigs from 684 active rigs a year ago to 947 rigs as of Jan. 7, according to a shale basin rig count compiled by NGI’s Shale Daily.

Houston-based Burlington Resources Inc. marched forward in the second quarter, with a 42% gain in earnings and a record 4% increase in overall production volumes. The producer reported net earnings of $537 million ($1.40/share), ahead of $379 million (96 cents) for the same period a year ago, and revenue rose to $1.69 billion from $1.33 billion.

California regulators Thursday marched through a series of small, unanimous decisions dealing with rates and tariffs of the major energy utilities in the state, headed by the allocation of Southern California Edison Co.’s $9.2 billion revenue requirement to different classes of customers based on a comprehensive settlement agreement with 15 stakeholder groups.

In a trading session that won’t soon be forgotten by bull norbear yesterday, natural gas futures marched easily higher as earlylong accumulation by funds morphed into a buying free-for-all whencommercials and locals entered the ring. After setting its dailylow during the first hour of trading at $5.80, it was up, up andaway for December, as it notched a new all-time commodity high at$6.025. The prompt month finished 31.8 cents higher on the day at$6.016. Meanwhile, soon to be spot month January was no slouch,gaining 29.6 cents to close at $6.002.