Dow Jones - Natural Gas Holding Ahead of Storage Update

DJ Natural Gas Holding Ahead of Storage Update


   By Timothy Puko


  Natural gas prices are holding close to unchanged as traders await clearer news about the state of gas stockpiles and
production.

  Natural gas for July delivery is down 1 cent, or 0.4%, at $2.881 a million British thermal units on the New York
Mercantile Exchange. Trading has stayed within a 5.2-cent range, a tight range common ahead of the U.S. Energy
Information Administration's weekly update on storage levels, scheduled for 10:30 a.m. EDT.

  It is likely to show that storage levels grew by 112 billion cubic feet, according to the average of 21 forecasters
surveyed by The Wall Street Journal. That would suggest a well-supplied market just days after the EIA said production
is likely to keep increasing and set a new monthly record by July.

  But EIA also cut its output expectations in the same report issued Tuesday for every quarter through 2016, and many
analysts using the same data believe it suggests production will actually start falling monthly in the second half of
this year. That has left some traders positioning themselves for a supply-demand dynamic that comes into balance,
falling back from severely oversupplied, later this year.

  "There's a lot of conflicting news right now," said Frank Clements, co-owner of Meridian Energy Brokers Inc. outside
New York. "People aren't quite sure."

  Physical gas for next-day delivery at the Henry Hub in Louisiana last traded at $2.88/mmBtu, compared with
Wednesday's range of $2.83-$2.94. Cash prices at the Transco Z6 hub in New York last traded at $2.92/mmBtu, compared
with Wednesday's range of $2.99 to $3.06.


  Write to Timothy Puko at tim.puko@wsj.com


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  (END) Dow Jones Newswires

  June 11, 2015 09:54 ET (13:54 GMT)

  Copyright (c) 2015 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.

061115 13:54 -- GMT
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