DJ Natural Gas Falls as Weather Forecasts Warm
By Timothy Puko
Natural gas prices continued their retreat toward the $2 mark Wednesday as warming weather forecasts for late
February suggest winter-heating demand won't be enough to resolve a potentially historic glut.
Futures for March delivery settled down 5.2 cents, or 2.5%, at $2.046 a million British thermal units on the New York
Mercantile Exchange. The retreat has given back about half of the gains from Friday and Monday, which had produced the
largest two-session rally in a month.
High stockpiles keep capping rallies in the gas market, which has been trading within a 40-cent range for nearly a
month. Last year brought record-high production but then a mild autumn and early winter severely hurt demand for the
heating fuel. A record-high amount of it ended up in storage.
Production hasn't fallen sharply since then, so stockpiles may still challenge their high point for winter's end
unless a lengthy stretch of extreme cold weather ramps up heating demand, analysts said. Updated weather forecasts keep
cutting the chances of that happening.
After a brief blast of extreme cold forecast for the eastern half of the country through this weekend, Wednesday's
weather updates showed a return to milder weather. Normal and, sometimes, far-above normal temperatures are likely to
cover most of the country for at least 10 days, according to several private weather companies.
"It appears everyone is shaking off the frigid weather we are in store for, and focusing on the warmer weather that
is forecast for the middle of next week," said Frank Clements , co-owner of Meridian Energy Brokers Inc. outside New
York.
Write to Timothy Puko at tim.puko@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
February 10, 2016 16:03 ET (21:03 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2016 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
021016 21:03 -- GMT
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