Natural Gas Storage Report - Jan 7

[dan_s]

Working gas in storage was 2,817 Bcf as of Friday, January 3, 2014, according to EIA estimates. This represents a net decline of 157 Bcf from the previous week. Stocks were 528 Bcf less than last year at this time and 315 Bcf below the 5-year average of 3,132 Bcf.

This is bullish for gas and a much bigger draw will be announced next week. The mild weather forecast for next week is putting pressure on natural gas prices today. However, the longer range forecast has cold weather returning to NE quarter of the U.S. by the week of January 17.

Assuming storage is ~2,500 Bcf on Jan. 10th, there is a darn good chance that storage by April will be pushing below 1,500 Bcf. That would be the lowest level in over six years. A cold March would be very interesting.