The natural gas market didn’t do much as the price of Henry Hub has slightly declined during the week. The recent decline in prices was partly due to the drop in demand for natural gas in the power sector and despite the sharp rise in demand in the Residential/industrial sector during last week; in total, the demand dropped last week; the supply also slightly contracted. Based on the EIA natural gas storage weekly update, natural gas storage buildup was only 46 Bcf, which was much lower than the five year average injection and last year’s injection.
Here is a short review of the recent changes in natural gas market for the week ending on September 20th 2013:
Natural Gas Market – September Recap
During last week, the Nymex Henry Hub Future (short term delivery) decreased by 1.36% and reached by Friday $3.687/mmbtu; its average daily change was 0.06%; its weekly average rate was 2.94% above last week’s average rate.
The spread between the NG future and spot prices – future minus spot – was mostly in Contango during the previous week.
Natural Gas Charts
The following charts show the developments in Nat-gas future (Nymex Henry Hub) in $/mmbtu during September 16-20.
As seen in the chart herein, the natural gas price (Henry Hub future rate) has slowly declined during last week mostly at the last couple of days.
In the second chart are the daily percent changes of the Nymex Henry Hub future (short term delivery).
EIA NG Storage Weekly Report:
The underground natural gas storage (Billion Cubic Feet) rose again during last week by 1.41% or by 46 Bcf; the storage reached 3,299 billion cubic feet for all lower 48 states; the current storage is 0.5% above the 5-year average but remained 5.4% below the storage during the same week last year. The recent injection was lower than the five year average and last year’s: During the same week in September 2012 the natural gas injection was 67 Bcf, and the five year average injection to storage for the same week of September was 72 Bcf. This week’s injection was mostly due to the Eastern consuming region, in which the injection was 41 Bcf.
For further reading: