RJ's Natural Gas Price Forecast - April 14

[dan_s]

This is a note from Raymond James Energy Sector Research Team:

"Although Trump tariff talks and the volatility of both tariffs and higher OPEC+ production have dominated the headlines for at least a month, U.S. natural gas trends remain about as topical as they’ve ever been in our analyst careers. Natural gas provides ~25% of the world’s energy, but typically takes a backseat to crude oil – that was not really the case in 2024 as the AI and power theme made the markets re-think the short, medium, and long-term prospects for natural gas demand – and it remains the case today with the natural gas market looking much more interesting than a crude oil market getting “attacked from both sides.”

Today’s Energy Stat addresses several cross-currents with U.S. natural gas supply/demand since we last published: 1) perceived to be weaker than expected U.S. production trends; 2) shifts in U.S. LNG project ramps (faster) and timing (mixed bag); 3) a decent improvement in natural gas power burns. To summarize, we see slight upside to strip pricing in 2025 at $4.40/MMBtu and massive upside in 2026 at $6.00.


Later, we highlight our top picks on the theme with Antero (AR) and Expand (EXE) leading the pack in E&P. In midstream, Cheniere (LNG) is our top-rated “gas name,” but Williams (WMB) and DT Midstream (DTM) remain incredibly topical and also have modest near-term and compelling long-term upside drivers.
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Go to the Antero Resources (AR) website and look at their recently updated outlooks for the U.S. natural gas and NGL markets. These are much different markets than the global oil market.

[dan_s]

You can find the production mix for each company on the Sweet 16 Summary Excel book or at the bottom of each company's individual forecast model.

This year it is extremely important to know what volumes of oil and gas that each company has hedged. That information is shown at the bottom of each company's forecast model.