Jan. 7 (Bloomberg) -- Natural gas futures were little changed on speculation that temperatures won’t be cold enough to trim a surplus of the heating fuel over the five-year average. Gas was steady after falling the past two days as temperatures may be normal or above-normal in the Northeast through Jan. 21, according to Commodity Weather Group in Bethesda, Maryland. Supplies of the fuel as of Dec. 31 were 6.5 percent above the five-year average, the Energy Department said. “There’s no shortage of gas, bottom line,” said Ed Kennedy, a trader at INTL Hencorp Futures in Miami. “The $4.60 to $4.70 range should be about it to the upside. We need a very cold February forecast to go higher than that.” Natural gas for February delivery rose 0.6 cent to $4.44 per million British thermal units at 9:11 a.m. on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The futures have gained 0.8 percent this week. --Editors: Bill Banker, Joe Link To contact the reporter on this story: Christine Buurma in New York at cbuurma1@bloomberg.net; To contact the editor responsible for this story: Dan Stets at dstets@bloomberg.net

Source