Persistently

With prices staying persistently low, now may be the best time to invest in long-term natural gas contracts, according to Paul Corby, senior vice president of Planalytics.

With prices staying persistently low, now may be the best time to invest in long-term natural gas contracts, according to Paul Corby, senior vice president of Planalytics.

A couple of western upticks notwithstanding, the overall cash market responded to persistently weak weather fundamentals, prior-day energy futures declines and correct expectations of a bearish storage injection report with price declines ranging from a little less than a nickel to about 30 cents. A considerable majority of the drops were in double digits.

With natural gas production down and prices remaining at persistently high and volatile levels, coal may be on its way back into favor for U.S. power generation, according to a report by Standard & Poor’s (S&P).

Unlike much of last month, when Western markets persistentlydisplayed weakness while their Eastern counterparts were rising, itis the West flexing a bit of price muscle this week. Rockies pipeswere back up into the $1.30s Tuesday after several had made a briefsojourn into sub-$1.30 territory Friday and Monday. The reason forthe rebound mystified one trader. “It’s not that cold in theregion, so go figure,” he said, adding maybe it was just a resultof the normal “tug of war” between gas buyers and sellers.