October natural gas prices settled down just less than 1% today, trading within a narrow 5.8-cent range following an even tighter range yesterday. Despite the pullback, prices are sitting right near resistance-turned-support following Monday's seeming break upwards. 

Yet despite the pullback yesterday into today, the 2018 natural gas strip has remained quite strong, as has been the case for the last couple of months. We made note of that this morning in our Morning Update, where we both noted that winter isolation in the morning's rally made it likely to fail (as it did) and that structural support for the market is continued by long interest later in the strip. Included in the daily report is a look at a number of contracts later in the natural gas strip to keep traders up to date heading into the trading day. 

Viewed another way, we continue to see the 2018 and 2019 natural gas strips as quite strong, which appears to have supported the front of the strip as well. 

This has come alongside recent strength in oil prices and the rest of the energy sector as well. 

It appeared, then, that all that was needed for this recent rally was a catalyst for cash prices to rally and pull the front of the strip up, which near-term heat appears to have provided. 

We now head into the weekly EIA data tomorrow sitting right near support with strong cash prices and a supportive strip.