Tuesday, March 3rd saw the front-month NYMEX Natural Gas contract open at $3.127, $0.167 above Monday’s closing price $2.960. Climbing to the intraday high of $3.188 amid the ongoing conflict in the Middle East, prices then fell to trade within a narrow band near $3.130. Trading sideways through midday, profit-taking dominated the late afternoon as the contract fell to an intraday low of $3.048 at 2:25PM. April closed higher on Tuesday at $3.054.
The EIA Natural Gas Storage Report published last Thursday posted a 52 BCF withdrawal from storage for the week ended February 20 – above the market estimate of a 41 BCF withdrawal. Total working gas in storage was reported as 2,018 BCF; 7.5% below this time last year and 0.3% below the five-year average.
As of 7:45AM this morning in Globex, WTI Crude was up $0.270; Natural Gas was down $0.036; Heating Oil was down $0.013; and Gasoline was up $0.020.
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