Unchanged

Natural gas futures seesawed to either side of unchanged only tofinish just a fraction of a cent higher yesterday as a late roundof fund buying retraced losses stemming from commercial and localselling earlier in the session.

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Fresh off a two-day, 24-cent price drop, natural gas futurestraded unchanged for most of the session Tuesday with light buyingand selling by trade accounts matching up nearly perfectly. Bymid-afternoon, however, it looked as if bears would make it atrifecta, as they successfully etched new lows for the Januarycontract down to $2.21. But after remaining on the sidelines formost of the day, speculators were seen as aggressive buyers intothe final bell. That enabled the January contract to finish on apositive note, up 4.7-cents to $2.271.

After much talk earlier in the week about how weak the cashmarket looks, it must have surprised some traders Wednesday to seeall but a few scattered points range from flat to as much as anickel higher. Between a neutral screen and no change infundamental factors, sources had trouble explaining why Tuesday’sprice skid came to such a quick halt only a day later. A marketersaid he wanted to suggest the “bears” had gone into hibernation,but it was too long before winter begins for that.

For the second day in a row the futures market probed to eitherside of unchanged yesterday as local traders attempted to influencethe market-first higher, then lower-in choppy, range-bound trading.But for the second day in a row they received little or no helpfrom other market participants, and thus were forced to cover intheir positions before the close. That enabled the October contractto drift quietly lower Monday, closing down 2 cents to $2.781.Estimated volume of 74,785 was well below Friday’s impressive114,000 figure.

For the third session in a row, natural gas futures see-sawed toeither side of unchanged yesterday as traders eschewed eitherbuying or selling the market outside of its recent trading range.After etching out a $2.34 low Tuesday morning, speculative buyingwas once again seen trying to push the July contract throughresistance at $2.40. But resistance held and the contract sank backto finish at $2.367, a 0.5-cent decline on the day.

After see-sawing 2 cents on either side of unchanged for much ofthe Nymex trading session yesterday, the futures market rumbledhigher late in the day to finish near its high. The June contractfinished up 2.9 cents at $2.302, which places it squarely in themiddle of its recent $2.205-$2.405 trading range. Estimated volumewas a relatively light 32,280.

A casual observer of yesterday’s market would look at the tighttrading range, low volatility and unchanged settlement and concludeit was a quiet trading day at the New York Mercantile Exchangewhere neither bull nor bear prevailed. But beneath February’s4-cent trading range and $1.714 settlement price, a battle waswaged as commercial traders in opposing camps, unencumbered bylocals who have largely moved on to March dealings, trieddesperately to influence a move in their direction. And so, as asource from a mid-sized gas marketer lamented, “the big boys wereat it again.”

As many traders predicted, the futures market continued lowerThursday morning amid a swirl of bearish fundamental factors, whichwere freshly updated Wednesday evening. But the dip wasshort-lived, and afternoon buying bid the spot January contractback up to test resistance, before settling at $1.84, off 0.7 centsfor the day.