Substantive

Even with springtime weather becoming more in evidence in nearly all areas as the Easter weekend approaches, prices saw fairly substantive gains at nearly all points Wednesday. The screen breaking a recent losing streak with a 5.7-cent rally Tuesday obviously played a role, but sources suggested several other minor factors that may have combined into an up day for cash.

After taking dives a day earlier, Northeast citygates rebounded by fairly substantive amounts Wednesday as blizzard conditions continued to rage from the Mid-Atlantic though southern New England. However, nearly all of the rest of the cash market was flat to nearly 15 cents lower as the wintry weather penetrating a great deal of North America failed to have much impact on most prices.

After taking dives a day earlier, Northeast citygates rebounded by fairly substantive amounts Wednesday as blizzard conditions continued to rage from the Mid-Atlantic though southern New England. However, nearly all of the rest of the cash market was flat to nearly 15 cents lower as the wintry weather penetrating a great deal of North America failed to have much impact on most prices.

With substantive heating load retreating largely to the sparsely populated Upper Plains of the U.S. and western half of Canada, and only a modest amount of power generation demand for air conditioning having built up in the southern U.S. to replace it, most points fell Monday.

Major increases in heating load were just over the horizon but not substantive enough for Friday to prevent further price losses Thursday in the Gulf Coast, Northeast and Midwest. But most points in the Midcontinent and West recorded increases.

There was a lot of talking on Capitol Hill about energy legislation last week, but in the end lawmakers made no substantive progress on energy policy before heading home for their month-long August recess. Last minute bills and threats, however, indicated they would be back to do it all over again in a short September session, before going off to get re-elected, or not.

On the verge of a long holiday weekend that would feature severe winter cold in nearly all areas, prices made substantive gains across the board Friday. Transco’s Zone 6-New York City pool saw quotes run as high as $27 and recorded an average increase of more than $11 as multi-dollar spikes at Northeast citygates led the cash market uprising.

Weekend forecasts of snow and icy conditions in northern market areas stretching from the Rockies to the Northeast and substantive prior-day screen support were unable to keep most of the cash market from softening Friday. More moderate weather across the southern third of the U.S., a slight warming trend in the Northeast, traders eschewing spot gas purchases in favor of using storage and the usual weekend loss of industrial load were considered the chief factors in the declines.

Wednesday’s price movement was mixed but biased to the downside. Continued substantive heating load kept most points firmer in the Gulf Coast and Northeast, but a string of futures losses coupled with already generally mild weather in the West and the approach of warmer conditions in the Midcontinent/Midwest had numbers mostly falling in those regions.