The May aftermarket began at price levels considerably below first-of-month indexes in nearly all cases, and several traders advised against anyone holding their breath while awaiting an upturn of any significance. They cited a screen plunge Monday that was about twice as large as any of last week’s single-day drops, a general near-term weather outlook that remains on the benign side, and expectations of another big storage injection report (Lehman Brothers is projecting 70 Bcf).
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Steady Selling Deals Futures Second-Straight Losing Session
Pressured lower by weaker crude oil futures along with a saggingphysical market, natural gas at the New York Mercantile Exchangewas softer Thursday with buyers on the sidelines, unwilling to addto their already hefty longs. After chopping lower for most of thesession the October contract received a late boost on renewedhurricane fears. However those late gains were more than offset byearly losses and that left the prompt month in negative territory,off 3.1 cents at $5.287 at the close yesterday.
Cash Mixed, But Screen Seen Boosting All Points Today
With a weaker screen during the morning and not a lot of solidweather load emerging from the weekend, most of the East was flatto down a few cents Monday. Western points continued a now-familiarpattern bracketing weekends: having suffered the biggest drops onFriday, they saw the biggest rebounds on Monday.
Bears See Green in St. Patrick’s Day Price Slide
Prompted by weaker physical prices and forecasts calling forwarming temperatures this week, traders in the natural gas pit atNymex had little choice but to push futures lower Friday as theycasually transferred long positions from the prompt contract to theback months. Slipping 6.6 cents on the day to finish at $2.785, theApril contract now sits just above trendline support on the dailychart, sources said.
Futures Give Back Early Gains, Finish Lower on Day
Relieving technically overbought conditions and following thelead of weaker mid-morning cash prices, traders ushered natural gasfutures off its morning highs yesterday to notch its first down daysince Wednesday, Feb. 23. The April contract lost 3.2 cents at$2.783.
Most of Market Weaker; Constraints Support Southwest
The 2000 cash market was sluggish and weak Tuesday as a fullcomplement of traders finally returned to their offices followingthe New Year’s holiday break. A sharp futures decline coupled withonly moderately cold weather in most regions depressed most pointsby about a dime or more below the levels at which they rang out theold year Thursday.
Heat Keeps Eastern Points on Rise; West Slightly Weaker
Cash prices turned in mixed results Wednesday, with easternpoints mostly eking out small gains while the West tended to beflat to off as much as 3 cents in the Rockies and at the two mainNorthern California price points.
Central Gulf Sale Results Weaker
Central Gulf of Mexico Lease Sale 172, held Wednesday in NewOrleans, garnered nearly $171.62 million in high bids out of$199.64 million in total bids. Of 3,806 blocks offered, 207received bids. There were 272 bids with an average of 1.31 bids perblock and 67 companies participating.
Winter Weather Worsens, But Prices a Bit Weaker
As many traders had expected, prices were unable to sustain thestrong upward momentum with which they began the week. Even asblizzard conditions got worse Tuesday in several major marketareas, quotes for today’s gas flow were flat to as much as a nickellower. Apparently utilities and other end-users started leaningmuch more heavily on their storage accounts after Monday’s cashrun-up left many points trading well above first-of-month indexes,especially in Eastern markets, one source said.
Late Futures Rally Caps Quiet Session
The futures market was able to sustain another day of weakercash prices Friday to trade on either side of unchanged on the day.A late rally on weak volume after many traders in New York andHouston had called it a week was the market’s only excitement forthe day and provided the November contract with a 1.4-cent boostgoing into the weekend to settle at $2.109.