NEW YORK: US natural gas futures dropped about 7% to a one-week low on Monday on record output and forecasts for mild weather to continue through late November, keeping heating demand low and allowing utilities to keep injecting gas into storage for at least a couple more weeks.
“Near-term weather forecasts have been revised notably warmer even as El Nino suggests warm winter temperatures along a longer horizon as well,” analysts at energy consulting firm Gelber and Associates said in a note.
Gelber noted the lack of a storage report this week from the US Energy Information Administration (EIA) due to a planned systems upgrade has added to the market volatility. EIA will resume its regular schedule on Nov. 13.
“The lack of available storage data this week has market participants paying special attention to weather forecasts in an effort to gain insight into how the withdrawal season will play out,” analysts at Gelber said.
Front-month gas futures for December delivery on the New York Mercantile Exchange fell 25.1 cents, or 7.1%, to settle at $3.264 per million British thermal units (mmBtu), their lowest close since Oct. 27.
That was also the biggest one-day percentage decline since the contract lost about 7.2% on May 22.
One bearish factor that has weighed on the futures market for most of this year has been lower spot or next-day prices at the Henry Hub benchmark in Louisiana.
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