The NYMEX February natural gas futures contract settled at $2.871/MMBtu Wednesday, down 6.7 cents, as the market continued to weigh current frigid temperatures against forecasts for milder weather later in the month. Wednesday’s settle price was the lowest since September 24, 2012, when the price closed at $2.837/MMBtu, but the February gas contract traded Wednesday in a range of $2.825-3.012/MMBtu. “When we came in this morning, the market had held out hope that after the coming warm-up, we would see a colder end of the month,” said Teri Viswanath, BNP Paribas analyst. “[At] the noon update, you saw the [Arctic] ridge that the market had been expecting disappear for month-end.” The Weather Channel forecasts sub-freezing lows across almost all of the lower 48 states on Thursday, stretching as far south as the Gulf Coast, northern Florida and South Texas, and sub-zero temperatures as far […]