Natural Gas Futures Decline in New York on Rising Surplus in Inventories

Natural gas futures fell in New York, heading for the first weekly decline in three weeks, on speculation that supplies will be sufficient to meet winter heating demand.

Gas futures slipped as inventories are 10 percent above the five-year average for the week ended Nov. 26. The surplus of gas in storage over the five-year average has risen in eight of the past 10 weeks.

“The fundamental picture remains really weak,” said Gene McGillian, an analyst and broker at Tradition Energy in Stamford, Connecticut. “We’re near 3.8 trillion cubic feet of gas and the production numbers are very robust.”

Natural gas for January delivery fell 2.1 cents, or 0.5 percent, to $4.322 per million British thermal units at 9:08 a.m. on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The futures have dropped 1.3 percent this week and 22 percent this year.

To contact the reporter on this story: Christine Buurma in New York at cbuurma1@bloomberg.net;

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Dan Stets at dstets@bloomberg.net