Friday, October 31st saw the front-month NYMEX Natural Gas contract open at $4.097, $0.132 above Thursday’s closing price of $3.965. Overnight gains driven by record LNG demand and forecasts calling for a chilly start to December soon gave way, with prices falling to trade around $4.030 by 9:45 AM. Marking the intraday low of $4.015 at 10:05AM, the contract proceeded to post a gradual rally that would span the session. Marking a seven-month intraday high of $4.143 at 2:10PM, December closed higher on Friday at $4.124.
The EIA Natural Gas Storage Report published last Thursday posted a 74 BCF injection to storage for the week ended October 24 – even with the market estimate of a 74 BCF injection. Total working gas in storage was reported as 3,882 BCF; 0.8% above this time last year and 4.6% above the five-year average.
As of 7:00AM this morning in Globex, WTI Crude was down $0.160; Natural Gas was up $0.121; Heating Oil was down $0.010; and Gasoline was down $0.001.
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