Daily Market Update February 7, 2020
Early Morning Update
The Mar20 natural gas contract is flat at $1.86. The Mar20 crude oil contract is down $0.68 at $50.27.
Summary
The prompt month, March 2020, NYMEX natural gas contract saw little movement during yesterday’s trading session, settling up a penny from Wednesday at $1.862/MMBtu. The EIA had reported a 137 Bcf withdrawal for the week ending January 31, 2020, at 10:30 am. While this was much smaller than the 228 Bcf pull for this time last year, it was close to the five-year average of 143 Bcf; the market was unphased. Longer-term contracts were also steady during yesterday’s trading session, calendar strips 2021-2024 hit new all-time trading lows on Wednesday, February 5, this week and remain firmly planted below $2.50/MMBtu. Looking ahead at the weekend, a storm system is moving through the northeast which could depress demand even further; however, a brief shift to cooler-than-normal temperatures is following the storm. The warmer-than-normal trend for the east coast is expected to return on Monday and continue with the 6-10 and 8-14 day outlooks from the National Weather Service displays mostly red hues for the eastern quarter of the country, while the western three quarters is blue.