Sagal 

I agree that it matters more now than 10 years ago but the question is how much more does it matter for NG traded in NYMEX? Did I read somewhere that 90% of this 10% of US NG production is anyway for Asia, and almost nothing for Europe and that most of the contracts for Asia are long term contracts with a prespecified price? So I would be more comfortable going long at the current level of price if the US forecast is clearly bullish, whatever the situation in EU is or will be.

33.6% of US LNG exports that landed in Oct went to Europe. 43.2% went to Asia.




https://public.tableau.com/app/profile/ron.h8870/viz/LNGTankers/VolByArea

SMCJB 

As @myrrdin and @ron99 mentioned, US LNG exports have increased significantly over the last 10 years. With US Natty prices in the Gulf Coast (where most of the export terminals are located) around $5/MMBtu and worldwide prices at $25 for TTF (Europe) and $31 for JKM every drop of LNG that can be exported, will be. It should be noted, that while we are exporting LNG from the Gulf Coast as fast as we can, during winter we will also be importing LNG. New England is still capacity constrained and can not support itself purely from US pipeline flows. As such places like the Everett LNG Facility in Boston Harbor will be importing LNG, which is also part of the reason that Natural Gas price in Boston (aka Alqonquin City Gate) are about $20/MMBtu for delivery in January despite prices in the Gulf being $5*. * The Algonquin basis is the price the price spread between Algonquin City Gate and Henry Hub. This can be traded on ICE as product ALQ. For price information go to https://www.ice.com/marketdata/reports/142 and select product ALQ.

The one surprise is that even though LNG prices have skyrocketed this summer US LNG exports per day were higher in Mar-May than they were Jun-Oct.

Dec JKM contract. https://public.tableau.com/app/profile/ron.h8870/viz/Energies-NGSpotPrice/LNGFutures



US LNG exports avg/day by month (yellow line). https://public.tableau.com/app/profile/ron.h8870/viz/Energies-NGPipelineFlow/LNGAllAvgDay

SMCJB 

In my example the prices in Boston for the peak of winter are $15/MMBtu higher than Henry, as that's the price they get the needed LNG to balance their system. I think you could also make the argument that if we have a cold winter here, and prices do spike that US/Henry prices could spike to the level where we start curtailing exports. I'm not sure what that price actually is but its considerably higher than $5.

Natural Gas has been an interesting market to say the least. Some volatile action both ways.

Right now approaching support levels and will be interesting to see price action, supply/demand at these levels you can see on the daily chart below:

NG Margin changes effective COB December 10h, 2021

Maintenance margin's changing as follows (Note: Non-member initial margin rates will be 110% of these)

Tier 1 / Jan22 from $7000 to $6300 -$700
Tier 2 / Feb22 from $7000 to $6000 -$1000
Tier 3 / Mar22 from $6500 to $5500 -$1000
Tier 4 / Apr22 from $3000 to $3300 +$300
Tier 5 / May22 from $2200 to $2550 +$350
Tier 6 / Jun22 from $2150 to $2400 +$350
Tier 7-10 / Jul22-Oct22 from $2150 to $2350 +$200
Tier 11-15 / Nov22-Mar23 from $2150 to $2350 +$175
All other months unchanged at $1125.

https://www.cmegroup.com/notices/clearing/2021/12/Chadv21-461.html

And over in Europe.... (courtesy of John Kemps 'Best in Energy'daily from 12/13. Highly recommend signing up for the free daily digest at https://twitter.us18.list-manage.com/subscribe?u=92fd2e3ec7962cda008f0732a&id=a5736ab8e1)



EUROPEAN NATURAL GAS futures prices are near record highs as inventories deplete rapidly. EU28 gas storage facilities are now just 62.8% full, 39 days ahead of the pre-pandemic five-year average, when they would have been expected to reach this level on Jan. 21:

NG Margin changes effective COB December 17th, 2021

Maintenance margin's changing as follows (Note: Non-member initial margin rates will be 110% of these)

Tier 1 / Jan22 from $6300 to $5300 -$1000
Tier 2 / Feb22 from $6000 to $5000 -$1000
Tier 3 / Mar22 from $5500 to $4750 -$750
Tier 4 / Apr22 unchanged at $3300
Tier 5 / May22 unchanged at $2550
Tier 6 / Jun22 unchanged at $2400
Tier 7-10 / Jul22-Oct22 unchanged at $2350
Tier 11-15 / Nov22-Mar23 from $2075 to $2225 +$150
All other months unchanged at $1125.

https://www.cmegroup.com/notices/clearing/2021/12/Chadv21-473.html

SMCJB 

The CME JKM LNG Futures don't trade. The ICE JKM LNG Futures do, and also have a very high (but slightly lower than CME) margin requirement of $30,600. For those of you not sure what we are talking about JKM stands for Japan/Korea Marker, and is an assessment of LNG (Liquidified Natural Gas) prices in the Far East. The contract size is the same as NG at 10,000 MMbtu, but instead of having a price of around $5/MMBtu they currently have a price of $27/MMBtu.

ICE just announced some margin changes that I was looking at. The margin on the JKM contract is increasing to $93,300! (10,000 MMbtu contract)

SMCJB 

ICE just announced some margin changes that I was looking at. The margin on the JKM contract is increasing to $93,300! (10,000 MMbtu contract)

Wow.

Kind of strange, looks like they didn't change the tiers at expiry. So if you rolled Jan to Feb it dropped $300 and now it dropping another $500

NG Margin changes effective COB January 5th, 2021

Maintenance margin's changing as follows (Note: Non-member initial margin rates will be 110% of these)

Tier 1 / Feb22 from $5000 to $4500 -$500
Tier 2 / Mar22 from $4750 to $4250 -$500
Tier 3 / Apr22 unchanged at $3300
Tier 4 / May22 unchanged at $2550
Tier 5 / Jun22 unchanged at $2400
Tier 6-9 / Jul22-Oct22 unchanged at $2350
Tier 10-14 / Nov22-Mar23 from $2225 to $2325 +$100
All other months unchanged at $1125.

https://www.cmegroup.com/notices/clearing/2022/01/Chadv22-002.html