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What a difference a day can make. Just 27 hours after testingkey support at $2.81, natural gas futures staged a completeturnaround, rallying to its highest daily continuation chartsettlement price this year. Nearly non-existent fundamental factorsgave traders little choice but to rely again on technical tradingtools for price direction. After the May contract posted animpressive gap higher open, that direction was in little doubt. Theprompt contract finished up 6.8 cents at $2.956, just a fraction ofa cent off its $2.96 high and within a nickel of its $3.005all-time high.

What a difference a week can make. For the third time in fourdays the April futures contract tested, but was unable to breakbelow stubborn support in the $2.71-74 area, leaving traders littlechoice but to bid up futures despite warming temperatures andfalling cash prices. The April contract finished up an impressive5.3 cents at $2.847. This advance came on the heels of last week’sprice activity, which saw the April contract twice test equallystubborn resistance at the $2.88-90 level. Aside from one falsebreakout to $2.67, the spot contract has consolidated within the$2.70-90 area since March 1.

Marking the start of what many expect to be a major trend overthe next few years, a Florida county authorized the construction ofa 460 MW gas-fired facility earlier this week. The $100 millionplant, which will be built and operated by Reliant Energy, willstart service in the fourth quarter of 2001. The Osceola CountyCommission Board approved the plan by a vote of 4-1.

BP Amoco released what it called strong fourth quarter 1999results, and CEO John Browne had favorable remarks regarding futurenatural gas prices.

BP Amoco released what it called strong fourth quarter 1999results, and CEO John Browne had favorable remarks regarding futurenatural gas prices.

CapacityCenter.com announced two new services and what it hopesis an improved, user-friendly interface yesterday.

Southwest Gas Corp. has sued Oneok, Inc. and Southern Union Co.following what it called “Oneok’s unjustified attempt to cancel themerger agreement between it and Southwest Gas.”

If Y2K doesn’t bring an end to the gas and power industries, itcertainly won’t do anything to stop them from hooking up. Judgingby what’s happened so far, gas and power will never stand alooffrom one another again.

If you don’t like the weather, wait a minute. And that’s exactlywhat the natural gas market will be doing this week followingforecasts calling for the coldest weather of the season togradually move south from Canada over the next couple of days. Buttraders weren’t waiting last Friday as they aggressively coveredshorts and initiated fresh longs in bullish anticipation of thefalling mercury. After gapping up at the open, the January spikedhigher Friday to finish at $2.446, a 16.1-cent advance for the day.