The NYMEX January natural gas futures contract settled at $1.990/MMBtu Friday, down 2.5 cents. A prompt-month contract has not settled lower since reaching $1.975/MMBtu on April 24, 2012. The fall in the January contract comes as the market shrugged off Thursday’s bullish gas storage report and instead focused on forecasts calling for above-average temperatures across much of the country in the coming weeks. Henry Hub spot prices also took a hit Friday, falling nearly 14 cents to average $1.77/MMBtu on IntercontinentalExchange. Spot prices at the hub have not traded lower since November 30, 2001, when they reached $1.75/MMBtu. “The temperatures right now are like spring. These are not heating degree days. Normally at this time of year we are talking about how deep the snow is. It’s hard to find any support in a market when you have spring-like temperatures and come into winter with record storage,” said Price […]