Dian L. Chu:Natural Gas: Better Days Ahead....in Two Years

Natural gas posted the first weekly increase this month in the week of Nov. 14, on forecasts of colder than normal temperatures in most of the eastern U.S. from Nov. 24 through Nov. 28, which could spur an average 20 percentage rise above the normal heating demand. Natural gas for December delivery down 25 percent this year gained 9.6 percent in one week to settle at $4.164 per Mmbtu on the NYMEX.

However, this temporary seasonal strength does not alter the fact that U.S. gas stockpiles climbed to an unprecedented 3.843 trillion cubic feet in the week ended Nov. 12. A 9.3 percent above the five year average level and 0.3 percent above last year’s level.

As I said before that we are literally swimming in crude oil amid high inventory, but when it comes to natural gas, “drowning” would be a more appropriate description. While crude was hammered by China’s efforts to curb inflation, natural gas has an even bigger problem, nowhere to go, since it is region bound, and not as widely traded.

Worse yet, the latest short term outlook published on Nov.9 by the Dept. of Energy estimates natural gas production will rise in 2010 to the highest level in 37 years. Marketed natural gas production is forecast to increase by 2.5 percent this year, and fall by 1.2 percent in 2011.

However, the drop in 2011 is not because of a decrease in shale gas production, but mostly a result of a 13.5 percent production decline in GOM production from the 2010 drilling moratorium......Read the entire article and see Dian's charts.



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Crude Oil Falls After Industry Report Shows Higher U.S. Oil, Gasoline Supplies

Oil fell after an industry funded report showed an increase in U.S. crude and gasoline stockpiles, signaling a recovery in fuel demand may falter. Oil declined for the sixth day in seven after an American Petroleum Institute report showed crude supplies increased 5.87 million barrels and gasoline inventories rose 2.03 million barrels last week. An Energy Department report today may show that crude stockpiles dropped 1 million barrels, according to a Bloomberg News survey.

“The fact that crude oil and gasoline is building, that’s definitely not good,” said Anthony Nunan, an assistant general manager for risk management at Mitsubishi Corp. in Tokyo. “We’ve got a ways to go before people are confident about the U.S. economy.” Crude oil for September delivery dropped as much as 34 cents, or 0.5 percent, to $75.43 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. It was at $75.62 at 12:10 p.m. Singapore time. Futures rose 0.7 percent yesterday to $75.77. Prices are up 9.2 percent from a year ago.

The Energy Department report may show U.S. gasoline supplies declined 375,000 barrels last week, according to the Bloomberg News survey. The report is scheduled to be released at 10:30 a.m. in Washington today. Work began on 546,000 houses at an annual rate last month, fewer than the 560,000 median estimate of economists surveyed by Bloomberg News and up 1.7 percent from June, Commerce Department figures showed yesterday in Washington.....Read the entire article.


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Reasons To Be Bullish On Crude Oil

With crude oil prices dropping on lower demand there seems to be crude bulls coming out of the woodwork. Why? There are plenty of reasons.....

Reason One.....
It appears that the recent OPEC production cuts are starting to be effective.

Reason Two.....
With Hamas rocket attacks on Israel finally being responded to, natural gas controversy in Europe and civil war in Nigeria the geopolitical front is having an obvious effect.

Reason Three....
The Bush administration and the current Energy Department has begun scheduling the purchase of crude oil over the next few months to replace oil drawn from the Strategic Petroleum Reserves during last years hurricane season. This could add up to 25 million barrels this year alone.

Reason Four...
The Chinese government has announced that it will be buying another 19 million barrels for the own reserves over the next few months. They will also complete the next phase of construction on storage facilities adding another 170 million barrels of storage capacity.

For now the trend has shifted sideways to higher for crude oil. But ultimately, regardless of all of these reasons to be bullish, the U.S. and now the Chinese consumer remains in the driver seat, literally.