Sessions

After resisting for nearly two trading sessions the promptcontract finally caved to selling pressure late Tuesday as localtraders liquidated the last of their positions. On that sour notethe October natural gas futures contract completed its tenure asprompt month yesterday by slipping 7.2 cents to $2.56. Estimatedvolume was robust as 122,906 contracts changed hands.

The price tug of war continued yesterday in the natural gas pitat Nymex, but in contrast to the previous seven sessions, bearswere victorious Wednesday as commercial sellers were too much forlocal buyers. After it was apparent the highs for the day had beenset, locals quickly changed their colors and were seen adding tothe selling pressure in a round of afternoon profit-taking. TheSeptember contract slid sharply at the close, settling down 4.4cents at $2.704.

For ninth time in the last 10 trading sessions, natural gasfutures were lower last Friday as sellers pressured theprompt-April contract to its life-of-contract low. No freshfundamental news was seen to lift the market, and as a result itfollowed the long-standing trend 3.1 cents lower to $1.628.