DJ Natural Gas Extends Losses After Inventory Report
By Nicole Friedman
NEW YORK--Natural-gas prices extended losses Thursday as traders looked ahead to expected lower demand.
Futures for September delivery settled down 9.6 cents, or 3.4%, to $2.768 a million British thermal units on the New
York Mercantile Exchange.
Forecasts released Thursday called for cooler weather in the Midwest and East in the next six to 10 days than had
been previously expected, according to Commodity Weather Group LLC. Cool temperatures reduce natural-gas demand in the
summer, as fewer people use gas-powered electricity to run their air-conditioning units.
Prices fell Thursday despite weekly inventory data showing that natural-gas stockpiles grew less than expected last
week. The smaller-than-expected inventory injection suggests that consumption was surprisingly strong or that
production was lower than anticipated last week.
Traders are now looking ahead to fall, when weather-driven demand typically fades and production is expected to
remain robust.
"The market has looked beyond what should have been a constructive number, and is looking ahead and is just not
seeing the heat that we're experiencing this week," said Teri Viswanath, director of commodity strategy for natural gas
at BNP Paribas SA. "The market has really vacillated between whether the heat's enough to move enough supply off-market
that we don't have a problem dealing with pipeline and storage constraints later in the season, and the concern that
there's just too much supply in the market."
Inventories now stand at 2.88 trillion cubic feet, 26% above the year-ago level and 3% above the five-year average
for the same week.
Write to Nicole Friedman at nicole.friedman@wsj.com
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(END) Dow Jones Newswires
July 30, 2015 15:09 ET (19:09 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2015 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
073015 19:09 -- GMT
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