Natural-gas prices closed at a new six-month low, resuming the market’s sluggish July as unseasonably cool weather keeps damping demand. Prices for the front-month August contract settled down 5 cents, or 1.2%, to $4.097 a million British thermal units on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The drop ended two days of nominal gains and brought prices down. They are now 14% lower since last month’s high on June 12. Record production and strong surpluses have been the market’s major influence since then. Money managers who once flooded the market with bets on rising prices started retreating during a record eight-week string of stockpile additions larger than 100 billion cubic feet. Preliminary forecasts from several analysts estimate a return to additions larger than 100 bcf this week. Weather forecasts are calling for temperatures more than 10 degrees below normal in some big Midwestern cities at a […]