Natural gas prices started the week with light gains, but as the week progressed natural gas was trade down.
Here is a short review of the development of natural gas prices for the week ending on December 30th, the last week of the year:
Natural Gas Prices December – Weekly Review and Analysis
Nymex Henry Hub Future Price (short term delivery) sharply declined during last week by 3.86% and reached on Friday $2.99 /mmbtu; its average daily change was -0.97%, and its weekly average price was 2.16% below the previous week’s average price.
Natural gas spot price (Henry Hub) on the other hand rose by 1.71% during the week, but its average price was only 0.05% above last week’s average price.
The difference between the Henry Hub future and spot gas prices, i.e. future price minus spot price (if the spot prices are higher than the future prices its called Backwardation, if future price is higher than its called Contango) continued to be in Contango during the week; by Friday the gap was nearly closed as it reached before expiration of the futures to $0.01/mmbtu, i.e. still Contango.
Natural Gas Prices Charts
The following charts present the daily changes of natural gas prices (Henry Hub) and futures prices (Nymex Henry Hub) in $/mmbtu during December 26 to December 30.
The first chart presents the development of natural gas spot price and Henry Hub future price during the week: the Henry Hub prices had a moderate downward trend during most of last week.
The second chart demonstrates the daily percent changes of natural gas spot price (Henry Hub) and Nymex Henry Hub future price. The sharpest increase in the natural gas spot price came on Tuesday, while the sharpest decline for the Henry Hub prices was on Thursday.
EIA Natural Gas Report – Highlights:
The underground natural gas storage (Billion Cubic Feet) declined for the fifth consecutive week; last week by 81 Bcf to 3,548 billion cubic feet for all lower 48 states; the current natural gas storage is 13.7% above the 5-year average, and is 9.1% above the storage level during the same week in 2010.
For the complete natural gas market report, see here.
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