The price of natural gas shed a modest 3 cents Friday to close the day at $4.36/MMBtu. The anticipation of healthy storage building on warmer spring weather depressed natural gas markets even with the bullish forecast of a large storage report this week due to recent colder-than-average weather. Bearish sentiment surrounding the onset of mild spring weather, lackluster demand, and the expectation of future storage builds place natural gas on a downward track entering [...]

The EIA reported a 12 Bcf build in natural gas storage for the week ending 3/25/2011, withing analyst expectations of a withdrawal of 20 Bcf to an injection of 17 Bcf. Working gas in storage was 1,624 Bcf as of Fiday, 12 Bcf less than last year’s 1,624 Bcf stock and 68 Bcf above the 5-year average of 1, 556 Bcf. [...]

Since mid-march, Natural Gas prices have risen over 13% but the last couple of trading sessions have seen both prices and the MACD retreat into what appears to be a consolidation. While a pause after such a rapid increase in price is typical, note the jagged pattern of trading between the top and bottom of the channel that’s occurred with some degree of precision on a [...]

Phase 2 of the re-opening of California’s Direct Access closed just as Phase 1 — withing minutes. Customers will be able to submit six month switching notices for phase 3 sometime in mid to late January 2011, and the submission process is expected to mirror that of the previous two Phases. Again, customers are encouraged to submit their notices as soon as the new Phase opens since space is extremely limited [...]