US natural gas futures fell in modest trade on Friday on short-term forecasts for milder weather. Front-month gas futures on the New York Mercantile Exchange fell 2.9 percent to close at $2.676 per million British thermal units, maintaining early-day losses.
Traders kept a weather eye on Hurricane Danny, the first hurricane of the 2015 Atlantic season, which strengthened to a potentially destructive Category 3 storm but remained relatively small and far from land, according to the US National Hurricane Center. It remains at least several days away from natural gas platforms in the Gulf of Mexico.
Future prices rose on Thursday on government data that less natural gas went into storage last week than expected, but the rally eventually weakened on fears of milder weather. The Global Forecast System weather model for the lower 48 US states projected 169.9 population-weighted cooling degree days over the next two weeks, lower than the 184.7 CDDs forecast on Thursday. The weather forecast has swung in both directions in the past few days, although most are calling for milder temperatures.
Thomson Reuters Analytics forecast that consumption in the lower 48 states would average 57.50 billion cubic feet per day over the next two weeks, down slightly from an outlook of 59.3 bcfd on Thursday. The US Energy Information Administration reported on Thursday that 53 billion cubic feet of natural gas went into storage for the week ended August 14, less than the 58 bcf estimate from a Reuters poll of analysts.
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