Moments

After wildly carving out a 15-cent trading range in the moments following the 10:30 a.m. EDT storage report (featuring a 75 Bcf injection), the natural gas futures market continued to march higher Thursday, proving that rising storage inventories are no match for the one-two combination of concerns over winter and bullish technical factors.

After checking lower in the moments following the news that 93 Bcf was injected into storage last week, the natural gas futures rebounded Wednesday as scale-down and technical buying propelled the market back above the $5.00 mark. At $5.05, the August contract closed 11.6 cents higher for the session, and just a few ticks below its $5.075 high on the day.

After spiking to a new high for the week in the moments following the release of a larger-than-anticipated 85 Bcf storage withdrawal, the natural gas futures market went lower in the late morning and afternoon Thursday as sellers liquidated positions ahead of an expected weekend weather warm-up. April crested at $5.62 at 11:15, up 34 cents from Wednesday’s settle, but then tumbled back down to $5.17 by the middle of the afternoon. It closed at $5.306, up 2.8 cents for the session.

After spiking higher moments after the release of fresh storage data showing a 247 Bcf withdrawal last week, natural gas futures slumped late Thursday morning as traders alleviated overbought conditions. Modest upticks were seen in the afternoon as bargain buying entered the fray. And though it was down 4.6 cents to $5.583 on its first day as prompt contract at Nymex, March was able to notch a higher high and a higher low for the session, giving some traders hope that another rally — while not likely — is possible.

Despite anxious moments, California’s staggering grid systemheld together Wednesday, avoiding the rolling blackouts somein-state market participants feared would happen in the wake of thefederal emergency order expiring.