Daily Market Update March 12, 2018

Early Morning Update

The Apr18 natural gas contract is trading up $0.06 at $2.79.  The Apr18 crude contract is down $0.34 at $61.70.

Summary

On Friday, the NYMEX natural gas futures price for April continued its slide from the previous session, losing 2.4 cents on the day to settle at $2.732/MMBtu. Cooling weather forecasts for the eastern half of the country have provided support to near-term pricing in reaction to increased heating demand for natural gas. The EIA reported a 2% increase in U.S. natural gas consumption for the week ending March 7th, the main contributor being residential/commercial related demand. U.S. natural gas production has been steady, rangebound between 77.5 to 78.5 Bcf/d. On March 5th, Dominion Energy’s Cove Point LNG export facility began commercial operations, and feedgas deliveries are expected to increase. During its final stage of commissioning, the facility shipped 3.0 Bcf of LNG on the first vessel, Gemmata. Last week, President Trump enacted tariffs on global imports of aluminum and steel, and there has been some concern from LNG pipeline project backers surrounding potential increases in project construction costs.

Market Update 031218