Daily Market Update October 18, 2021
Early Morning Update
he Nov ‘21 natural gas contract is trading down $0.22 at $5.19. The Nov ‘21 crude oil contract is up $1.34 at $83.62.
Summary
ast week’s NYMEX natural gas pricing activity was a bit of a mixed bag. Near-term pricing through this upcoming winter came off a touch, while longer-term calendar strips continued to ascend. The prompt-month contract sold off 15.5 cents last week, closing out at $5.410/MMBtu. While Q1-22 lost 8 cents to close at $5.546/MMBtu. The calendar years for 2022 through 2030 all moved higher last week. lead by 2023 which gained 11.6 cents to close at $3.615/MMBtu. Calendar 2022 gained 9.5 cents, closing at $4.476/MMBtu. Beyond 2022/23, the longer-term calendar strips all settled soundly over the $3 mark, prices not seen since late-2016. Week over week, production of natural gas is down 0.5 Bcf/day, averaging 90.2 Bcf/day. As weather patterns shift in favor of heating demand, estimates are calling for a rise in Res/Comm demand and a drop in Power Burns. Also, the EIA reported an 81 Bcf injection into storage last week vs. 84 estimate. This was much better than the 50 Bcf build last year for the same week and higher than the 79 Bcf five-year average injection.