NEW YORK: US natural gas futures held near a 12-week low on Thursday as the market waited for direction from a federal report expected to show a smaller-than-usual storage withdrawal due to mild weather and low heating demand last week.
That lack of price movement came despite a bullish drop in daily output and a bearish decline in flows to liquefied natural gas (LNG) export plants in recent days due to disruptions at several plants, including Freeport LNG’s facility in Texas.
Front-month gas futures for February delivery on the New York Mercantile Exchange fell 0.4 cent, or 0.1 percent, to USD3.116 per million British thermal units, putting the contract on track for its lowest close since October 17 for a second day in a row.
Analysts forecast energy firms pulled 90 billion cubic feet (bcf) of gas out of storage during the week ended January 9. That compares with a decline of 227 bcf during the same week last year and an average withdrawal of 146 bcf over the past five years (2021-2025).
In the cash gas market, average prices at the Waha Hub in the Permian Shale in West Texas remained in negative territory for a third day in a row and the sixth time this year as pipeline constraints trapped gas in the nation’s biggest oil-producing basin.
Waha prices have averaged a negative 21 cents per mmBtu so far this year, compared with USD1.15 in 2025 and a five-year average (2021-2025) of USD2.88.
Daily Waha prices first averaged below zero in 2019. They did so 17 times in 2019, six times in 2020, once in 2023, a record 49 times in 2024, and 39 times in 2025.
Financial firm LSEG said average gas output in the Lower 48 states slid to 109.1 billion cubic feet per day (bcfd) so far in January from a monthly record high of 109.7 bcfd in December.
On a daily basis, output was on track to drop to a preliminary 12-week low of 106.2 bcfd on Thursday due mostly to declines in North Dakota and Texas, according to LSEG data, down from 108.0 bcfd on Wednesday and a record 111.2 bcfd on December 21.
Meteorologists projected weather across the country would remain mostly colder than normal through January 30, with the most frigid days expected around January 18-20, which includes the US Martin Luther King Jr. holiday weekend on January 17-19.
LSEG projected average gas demand in the Lower 48 states, including exports, would rise from 136.2 bcfd this week to 150.1 bcfd next week. The forecast for next week was lower than LSEG’s outlook on Wednesday.
Average gas flows to the eight large US LNG export plants held at 18.5 bcfd so far in January, the same as December’s monthly record high.
On a daily basis, LNG feedgas was on track to rise from an 11-week low of 16.3 bcfd on Wednesday to a preliminary 17.8 bcfd on Thursday with flows to Freeport LNG’s 2.4-bcfd plant in Texas, which shut on Tuesday, expected to jump from 0.5 bcfd on Wednesday to 1.8 bcfd on Thursday.
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