Spring-like weather was starting to bust out in quite a few areas Friday and due to continue through the weekend. That was evident in the spot gas market as prices fell at nearly all points. The weekend loss of industrial demand was another bearish factor, while the previous day’s 4.5-cent gain by March futures obviously did little to support cash numbers.

A few flat to barely higher locations in South and East Texas averted a clean sweep of softness. Otherwise, losses ranged from a couple of pennies to about $1.40. Northeast citygates continued to decline by triple digits, but Friday’s plunges were much smaller than those of a day earlier. That likely was due to a cold front expected to move through the region Sunday, The Weather Channel (TWC) said.

Forecasts of sub-freezing lows were getting scarce going into the weekend. The areas where they were still being predicted were chiefly in the Rockies and locations near the Canadian border.

Even with forecasts of weekend snow in the mountain areas just north of Los Angeles, the Southern California border and SoCal citygate fell nearly a quarter each. Of course, the city itself wasn’t expect to get below about 50 degrees Saturday.

Much of the Midwest and Northeast was due to peak in the 40s and 50s Saturday, while the South could expect to top out in the 60s and 70s. Following record warmth in the Plains states Friday, a cold front was due to swing through much of the region during the weekend and subsequently into the Midwest, TWC said. But while the front would eclipse the warmth to some extent, it would not do away with above-average temperatures, the forecasting service added.

Cold weather-related OFOs continued to disappear Friday (see Transportation Notes). In a reflection of the changing eastern outlook, MRT cited warmer temperatures in saying it planned to implement a new System Protection Warning Saturday.

Kern River, which previously in the week had been reporting high linepack in three of its four segments, said linepack was high systemwide Friday. Despite the excess supply issue Rockies softness was fairly moderate, with no point in the region falling by more than the upper teens.

Looking at predictions of above-normal temperatures throughout the East, a Northeast marketer said he saw little chance of a cash market rally in the coming week. However, he did attribute a rebound by March futures to a 13.2-cent advance after a weak start to short-covering and “slightly colder forecasts” for the week than before.

The marketer said basis spreads from Gulf Coast to the Northeast were covering variable transport costs, but just barely. Traders can’t make any substantive extra money by moving gas themselves, he said.

A western trader reported seeing regional prices trade within very narrow ranges for the last couple of weeks. Western markets have been pretty sedate recently due to mostly above-normal temperatures, he said, but things should pick up this week as the forecast changes to below normal. He added that it was surprising to see how cheap gas has gotten this month in the Southwest production basins.

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