Natural gas futures for May delivery traded up about 1% in advance of the EIA’s report, at around $2.63 per million BTUs, and jumped to around $2.68 (up more than 2.5% for the day) following release of the EIA report. At $2.68, natural gas futures have remained about flat per million BTUs in the past five trading days. The 52-week low for natural gas futures is $2.58. One year ago the price for a million BTUs was around $4.00.
Demand for heating was low earlier this week as warmer weather once again blanketed most of the United States. The rest of this week is expected to offer more of the same, except for some cooler weather in the north central and northeast states. Demand for next week is currently forecast to be low again.
The peak demand season for natural gas runs from November through March. As more electricity generation has converted from coal-fired to natural gas-fired, demand for the summer cooling season is higher than it once was, but it remains about 30% below winter heating demand.
Stockpiles are about 75.4% above their levels of a year ago and about 11.5% below the five-year average.
The EIA reported that U.S. working stocks of natural gas totaled about 1.46 trillion cubic feet, around 190 billion cubic feet below the five-year average of 1.65 trillion cubic feet and 628 billion cubic feet above last year’s total for the same period. Working gas in storage totaled 833 billion cubic feet for the same period a year ago.
Here is how stocks of the largest U.S. natural gas producers reacted to this latest report:
Exxon Mobil Corp. (NYSE: XOM), the country’s largest producer of natural gas, traded up about 0.5% to $84.88, in a 52-week range of $82.68 to $104.76.
Chesapeake Energy Corp. (NYSE: CHK) traded up about 0.5%, at $14.41 in a 52-week range of $13.38 to $29.92.
EOG Resources Inc. (NYSE: EOG) traded up about 0.5% to $91.65. The 52-week range is $81.07 to $118.89.
Furthermore, the United States Natural Gas ETF (NYSEMKT: UNG) traded up about 2.6%, at $13.44 in a 52-week range of $12.99 to $26.88.
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