Daily Market Update December 19, 2018
Early Morning Update
The Jan19 natural gas contract is trading down $0.21 at $3.63. The Jan19 crude contract is up $0.56 at $46.80.
Summary
After falling throughout last week and Monday, NYMEX natural gas rebounded, gaining 31 cents on Tuesday to close at $3.838/MMBtu. The first quarter of 2019 followed suit, gaining 28 cents, which dragged the 2019 calendar strip back above the $3 mark, closing at $3.07/MMBtu, a gain of 11 cents. The abrupt halt to the week-long $1 decline from last Monday had a lot to do with revisions to the 16-20 day weather forecasts, that are now calling for colder-than-average temperatures across the eastern and southern United States to kick off January. This was a swing of nearly eight degrees for some regions, as previous forecasts had predicted that the warmer-than-average December temperatures would continue into next month. Should these forecasts hold out, the resulting increase in ResComm heating demand would put further strain on the already large deficit to natural gas storage inventories.