What Next for Nat Gas?

Nearest natural futures prices peaked on December 13, 2005 at 15.78, and hit a bear market low on April 19 & 20, 2012 at 1.902, but the dominant longer-term trend remains down.

The April low resides within an 8-month basing-accumulation pattern that has carved out a climb from 1.902 to 3.277, which represents the dominant intermediate-term uptrend.

Finally, we have the near-term trend, which encompasses the July-August correction of the April-July advance.

Thus far, the correction has pressed natural gas to 2.700-2.6800, which amounts to an 18% decline, but represents a 43% retrace of the entire initial upleg.

In the aftermath of a powerful, devastating, 7-year bear market, the basing and transitional process into a new bull market takes time, and can involve wide swings of the short-term trend as the intermediate-term trend continues to develop.

Such is the case now in the aftermath of the April-July up-move.

Although my near-term work indicates that the natural gas correction is complete at 2.682, if I am wrong, then the next most important "support window" is 2.585 to 2.495 prior to my expectation of the next upleg in an emergent bull market for natural gas and the United States Natural Gas (UNG).