Momentum

With the momentum behind Monday’s rebound now fully dissipated, October natural gas futures on Wednesday returned to the recent business of scouting lower values. The prompt-month contract reached a low of $3.708 before closing the regular session at $3.762, down 5.4 cents from Tuesday.

The natural gas futures market’s bearish momentum Thursday spilled over into Friday as the September contract recorded a low of $4.456 before closing the regular session at $4.467, down 13.1 cents from Thursday’s close and 45.6 cents lower than the previous week’s finish.

With the peak season for Atlantic hurricanes upon us as the calendar flips to August, natural gas futures kept the momentum to the upside rolling on Friday as the September contract added 9.6 cents to $4.923. The contract closed the week 36 cents higher than the previous week.

Unable to maintain the upside momentum that natural gas cash points have enjoyed for most of the last week and a half, averages on Wednesday fell in a big way, which just so happened to coincide with the first significant decline in front-month natural gas futures since the contract rollover on April 29.

June natural gas futures fell Tuesday as the market opened up but was unable to muster sufficient momentum to break higher. Some traders are still optimistic of an advance, however.

Tuesday’s upward momentum carried over to Wednesday as most cash point averages for Thursday delivery climbed. Increases were predominant in every region except the East, which saw a few gains sprinkled in amongst no changes and declines.

Natural gas futures bulls tried to capitalize on Thursday’s momentum in early Friday trade by pushing the July contract north of $4.100, but profit-takers had other ideas as the prompt-month contract reversed course in a hurry to close the day’s regular session at $3.835, down 12.2 cents from Thursday’s finish.

Maintaining the momentum from the final two days of trading last week, natural gas futures on Monday — aided by strength in equities and petroleum futures — continued higher despite the lack of direct bullish fundamentals. The April contract climbed 6.7 cents to close at $4.294.

Capitalizing on Tuesday’s downward momentum, December natural gas futures dropped another 30 cents Wednesday to close at $6.405 as rumors swirled that longs were getting squeezed out of their positions.