The cash market once again ignored spreading mild weatherWednesday and posted price gains that were most often around anickel. Although the central and northern Atlantic Coast regionswere still feeling some late-winter chill, most of the rest of thenation ranged from spring-like to somewhat summerish. So the pricestrength again derived from the screen, sources concluded. It onlyemphasises, one said, that “this market never really has been doingwhat the weather indicates it should this winter.”

The afternoon storage report met most expectations and hadalready been factored in by cash traders, a marketer said.

Texas points traded mostly in the mid $2.20s, and volumes werevery big at Agua Dulce as the state is feeling enough heat duringthe day to generate some air conditioning load, a marketer toldDaily GPI.

One source clarified the nuclear plant situation that has buoyedSouthwest prices. The Comanche Peak outage in North Texas wasn’tunexpected, he said, but rather a unit went down for refueling lastweekend. TUFCO, the gas purchasing arm of TU Electric, continued tobe a significant buyer at Waha, he added. Also, Arizona’s PaloVerde plant has a unit down for refueling until about mid-April,and that’s undoubtedly adding to Southwestern gas load as SouthernCalifornia is relatively cool while people in the Arizona-NewMexico area experience daytime highs in the 70s and 80s, the sourcesaid.

Fixed-price quotes for April remained scarce as traders mainlystuck to basis or index business. A source expects a lot of bidweekbusiness to be done Monday and that trading will continue “right upto the end.” For right now the market is extremely volatile,especially for “a dead month” like April, he went on.

Panhandle Eastern and ANR-Southwest deals at minus 12 basis werereported by one trader. He also said Chicago citygate basis wasplus 7, but another source said he was doing Chicago at plus 5.75.Appalachian basis reports included TCO at plus 13 and CNG-NorthPoint at plus 17.

A marketer is seeing early April numbers at Malin around $2.00,slightly above current March levels, but Southern California borderdeals in the mid $2.40s are more than a nickel up, he said. Thebid-ask spread at the PG&E citygate is a SoCal border indexplus 2-4, he added. A Calgary source is hearing intra-Albertanumbers at C$1.79-82, about even with March prices.

A Gulf Coast/Northeast trader said he can’t wait for summer toget “hot, hot, hot” so some electric generation load can get going.He was tired of the current market because “right now everybody isarguing and theorizing about storage injections and withdrawals,and whether utilities are going to put off injection purchasesuntil late this year.”

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