Natural gas is exploding

Up 41 cents on the day at time of writing.

 

The widowmaker got out to 96 or 97 cents. If this keeps up, someone will be writing a book about the 2013/2014 heating season.

I need to pick up a copy of this, before Amazon sells out.

http://www.amazon.com/Hedge-Hogs-Traders-Streets-Disaster/dp/1400068398

 

Wait until it's in the dollar-bin at Barnes & Noble.

 

Which of those red lines has tomorrow's settlement price?

 

well spotted. Thx.

 

Some big movements tonight on NG. I wasn't watching when it happened, but looks like it came back down after about 45 minutes.

 

The H/J $2.00 call on the spread traded about 2.0-2.5 cent several weeks ago and earlier this week someone traded the $1.00 calls for size.

Weather forecasts and inventory estimates are bullish.

 

Yep. Look at the HDD data.

 

Re NG options, maybe one of you can help. I've written to the CME but never received a reply (surprise). NG Amer-style options have an OI of about 272K, Euro-style options have an OI of about 5 million (see images). The situation is reversed in Crude (CL), i.e. virtually all the activity is in the Amer-style options.

Couple of questions:
1. Why do the cash-settle Euro-style options in NG far outweigh the physical-settle Amer-style options?

2. I can't seem to get a straight answer about whether the NG Euro-style options are OTC and/or available to only the largest players. Example: on the CME fact sheet, they don't say "OTC" and on the Interactive Brokers platform I can get a quote, but every time I place an order it gets rejected. Capital/margin should not be an issue; do I need to request some sort of additional trading privileges? I've asked IB and they weren't much help. They said I should be able to trade them but followed with "they aren't very liquid." That doesn't make sense given the OI differences.

For now, the Amer-style are enough for the size I'm trading, but given the disparities in liquidity, down the road I might be hindered if I'm trying to do something more complex. At a minimum, it seems like fills might take longer and fill quality would suffer.

Thanks!

 

I'm not sure that IB clears Nymex Clearport products - but I sure as hell know for a fact that Timber Hill trades the living shit out of them.

I checked the Clearport broker directory and IB is not listed. As I recall, most of the LN I traded was through OTC brokers like Amerex and Icap and TFS. And it did indeed require some decent margin.