Natural gas rallies as blast of cold air sweeps across U.S.

Natural gas futures rose on Monday as weather-forecasting models continued to call for a blast of wintry weather to sweep acrossthe central and eastern U.S. in the coming days.

Longer-range forecasts, meanwhile, eased off earlier calls for a warm snap in January, which boosted prices even further.

On the New York Mercantile Exchange, natural gas futures for delivery in February traded at USD4.453 per million British thermal units during U.S. trading, up 1.93%.

The commodity hit a session high of 4.471 and a low of 4.407, with support seen at 4.333, Friday's low, and resistance seen at 4.577, the high from Dec. 23.

The February contract settled 2.41% lower on Friday to end at USD4.368 per million British thermal units.

Updated weather forecasting models called for chilly temperatures across the East Coast of the U.S. during the next six to ten days.

Colder-than-average winter temperatures increase the need for gas-fired electricity to heat homes, boosting demand for natural gas.

Longer-range forecasting models backed off on earlier calls for a warming trend to settle in the next two weeks.

Natgasweather.com reported in its 8-14 day outlook that while uncertainty remains and warmer temperatures are possible, more blasts of cold air could trek across the country and hike demand for heating in the country's homes and business.

Meanwhile, U.S. supply levels remained in focus. Total U.S. natural gas storage stood at 3.071 trillion cubic feet as of last week, approximately 16% below last year's unusually high level and nearly 9% below the five-year average for this time of year.

Early withdrawal estimates for this week's storage data range from 110 billion cubic feet to 150 billion cubic feet, compared to a drop of 126 billion cubic feet during the same week a year earlier.

The five-year average change for the week is a decline of 121 billion cubic feet.

Elsewhere on the NYMEX, light sweet crude oil futures for delivery in February were down 1.10% to trade at USD99.22 a barrel, while heating oil for February delivery were down 0.81% to trade at USD3.0669 per gallon.