Please visit the Direct Energy Business online customer education center, Energy Insights, to view my Weekly Energy Market Update video for June 24, 2013. Receive weekly updates that are sent right to your email inbox.

The following is a summary of last week’s market activity and the market outlook:

• Natural gas futures rallied Monday through Wednesday but then fell back off on Thursday and Friday, after another solid storage injection and in correlation with overall commodity/equity trends. The July NYMEX finished up 4 cents at $3.77 and the 12-month Strip finished up 3 cents at $3.93, while long-term prices were flat, with Cal. ’14 at $4.04 (up 3 cents) and Cal ’15 at $4.17 (up 2 cents).
• Storage injections have remained above historicals and far above last year. Last week the EIA reported an injection of 91 Bcf, which was near expectations but well above last year and the 5-year average. Current inventory through June 14 is 2,338 Bcf, which is 559 Bcf (18.7%) below last year and 47 Bcf (1.9%) below the 5-year average.
• June has been mild, and low demand has contributed to strong injections but downside may be limited by mixed near-term weather that could bring heat and concerns that it is still very early in the summer. In fact, we are seeing our first shot of heat this week.
• Overall, we saw a slowdown this week in the market downturn of the previous three weeks. If you are looking to buy soon, consider that we are near the bottom of the recent range and there is still plenty of summer heat risk.