The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) reported Thursday morning that U.S. natural gas stocks decreased by 74 billion cubic feet for the week ending March 28. That compared with an expected drop of 73 billion to 77 billion cubic feet anticipated by analysts. Natural gas futures prices were trading about up 0.3% in advance of the EIA’s report, at around $4.40 per million BTUs, and slipped slightly to $4.38 immediately following the report.

A strong spring storm is expected to affect portions of the Midwest and Great Lakes region late this week before moving into the Northeast. Cooler weather is expected until early next week, when warming temperatures will return to the Midwest. This spring pattern looks likely to repeat into the following week as well.

The country’s natural gas supply fell below 1 trillion cubic feet three weeks ago for the first time since 2003. With stockpiles so low, there is some concern that injections to storage over the next several months will not be enough to meet demand for next winter. That is a long way off though, and supply right now seems to be sufficient for expected demand.

The EIA reported that U.S. working stocks of natural gas totaled 822 billion cubic feet, about 992 billion cubic feet below the five-year average of 1.81 trillion cubic feet. Working gas in storage totaled 1.7 trillion cubic feet for the same period a year ago. Natural gas inventories continue to drop further below the bottom of the five-year range.

Here is how stocks of the largest U.S. natural gas producers reacted to this report:

Exxon Mobil Corp. (NYSE: XOM), the country’s largest producer of natural gas, was up fractionally to $98.02, in a 52-week range of $84.79 to $101.74.

Chesapeake Energy Corp. (NYSE: CHK) was up about 0.7%, at $26.62 in a 52-week range of $18.21 to $29.06.

EOG Resources Inc. (NYSE: EOG) was up 1.2% to $100.29. The 52-week range is $56.03 to $100.54. The high was posted earlier in the morning.

 

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