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A liquefied natural gas (LNG) tanker arrives at a gas storage station.
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Natural gas prices have surged more than 35% in the past month, as worries grow there is not enough gas stored up for the winter should temperatures be especially cold in the northern hemisphere.

The usually quiet market for the commodity has become hot in the last couple of weeks, as investors focus on the growth in demand around the world and supplies remain below normal. The biggest problem area is Europe, where supply is at a record low for this time of year.

Even in the U.S., the amount of gas in storage is 7.6% below the five-year average, according to recent data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration. Natural gas is an important heating fuel and is responsible for about 35% of power generation in the U.S., the federal agency found.

“People are starting to throw the ‘crisis’ word around” when it comes to Europe, said John Kilduff, partner with Again Capital. He said natural gas in storage in Europe is 16% below the five-year average, and the level in storage is a record low for September.

“Europe is squarely behind the eight ball going into the winter season. It’s going to put the focus on this commodity that’s been overlooked for the last several years,” said Kilduff.

The tipping point could come in several months when it becomes clear what type of winter is ahead for Europe, and also the U.S. Some analysts say in an extreme scenario, U.S. prices could double if there is an extended cold spell, particularly in Europe where shortages could get severe.

“If the winter is mildly cold, it’s going to be problematic for sure,” said Francisco Blanch, head of commodities and derivatives strategy at Bank of America.

Rising prices for natural gas

Natural gas futures for October jumped nearly 5.3% Monday, to about $5.20 per one million British thermal units, or mmBtus. Natural gas is up 106% year-to-date and is the highest in more than seven years. But the equivalent gas in Europe and Asian markets is upwards of $20 per mmBtus.

“The U.S. is supposed to be an island, but in the last three or four years, there’s an increasing link between the U.S. and global market,” Blanch said. “We’ve gone from 50% correlation to 95% correlation. The U.S. market is being dragged around by this.”

The U.S. has been exporting natural gas, in the form of liquified natural gas shipments. The shipments have grown to about 10% of U.S. production, analysts said. South Korea is the largest customer, followed by China and Japan, according to U.S. government data. But buyers also include Brazil India, Poland, Spain, France and Portugal.

“If it’s a cold winter, gas will not just be tight. It will be very tight,” said Daniel Yergin, vice chairman of IHS Markit. If that’s the case, prices could go sharply higher. “It will either be physical shortages, or it will be reflected in price.”

Strategists say for now the world’s gas supply is stretched, but prices could fall if the autumn and early winter are mild, and more gas is put in storage.

“We lean toward a lot of risks for price spikes, rather than higher and higher sustained prices,” said Christopher Louney, commodities strategist at RBC.

Weather patterns and gas demand

Brian Lovern, chief meteorologist at Bespoke Weather, said the U.S. is in a La Niña state, which could mean a warmer than normal October and November in the northern U.S.

Fewer days that require heating could mean more gas will go into inventories before the coldest winter weather.

“I think in a few weeks, the weather is going to give us some bearish headwinds [for natural gas] as we get into the October, November period. That does not mean we won’t see a colder winter,” he said.

Europe’s winter will depend on a weather pattern that sets up over Greenland. “The early indications do not indicate a big cold winter over there,” Lovern said.

The market is anxious about a repeat of last year, when a cold winter in Europe resulted in a larger-than-normal drawdown of gas.

Supplies were not built back up enough in Europe, and analysts said lately Russia had cut back on some exports into Europe. But the new Nord Stream 2 pipeline, bringing natural gas from Russia to Europe, could resolve some of the supply problems for the continent in the next couple of months.

Russia’s Gazprom last week announced completion of the pipeline, which had once been opposed by the U.S. The pipeline would allow Russia to double gas exports to Europe. Germany’s energy regulator Monday said it has four months to complete certification of Nord Stream 2.

Global impact

The situation in Europe has caught the attention of U.S. officials. Amos Hochstein, the U.S. State Department’s senior advisor for energy security, told reporters Friday that he was concerned about supply, and potential shortages if the winter is very cold.

Hochstein said U.S. deliveries of liquified natural gas, known in the industry as LNG, can be increased and Russia is coming off the period of low supply.

“There’s different explanations for what’s going on, why Russian supplies are constrained,” said Yergin. “Russian and German regulators are in a debate as to whether new regulations apply that were put in place after the pipeline was given its final investment decisions.”

Yergin said Asian demand has also been a factor in the short supplies. Chinese liquified natural gas demand was 20% higher than what was anticipated, he said.

TortoiseEcofin’s senior portfolio manager Rob Thummel said Europe also did not get sufficient liquified natural gas cargoes to rebuild its inventories. “What happened was Brazil hydroelectric power didn’t come to fruition,” he said.

“There was drought, so Latin America and Brazil needed natural gas,” Thummel added. During Europe’s summer, “a lot of LNG… ended up in Brazil in particular.”

Supplies in Europe were not replenished, and there was a jump in demand. “Asia and China in particular got nervous. They started buying LNG,” he said.

Thummel said he does not expect a serious problem for the U.S. this winter, and prices could come back down. He said there has been an increase in rig count in the Haynesville shale. “You’re likely to see higher volumes,” he said.

One issue for the U.S. has been lower volumes of shale oil production. A byproduct of that production is natural gas.

“I would say the volatility in U.S. price will not be the same as it has been, and likely will be in Europe,” said Thummel. The amount of gas going into winter is about 8% below the five-year storage average, but “it’s not the end of the world,” Thummel said.

As natural gas prices have jumped, so have the stocks of gas producers, like the largest EQT, Range Resources, and Antero Resources. Investors have also jumped into the United States Natural Fund ETF, which bets on the commodity.

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Cybertruck backlog runs out, Model S gets stuck, GM hits a sales milestone

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Cybertruck backlog runs out, Model S gets stuck, GM hits a sales milestone

On today’s episode of Quick Charge, Tesla’s Cybertruck is now available in Canada – and, like in the US, there’s no waiting! Plus, we’ve got an “actually” smart summon Tesla that’s actually stuck, GM reaches a sales milestone, and we get a brand-new title sponsor!

Today’s episode is the first with our new title sponsor, BLUETTI – a leading provider of portable power stations, solar generators, and energy storage systems.

Prefer listening to your podcasts? Audio-only versions of Quick Charge are now available on Apple PodcastsSpotifyTuneIn, and our RSS feed for Overcast and other podcast players.

New episodes of Quick Charge are recorded, usually, Monday through Thursday (and sometimes Sunday). We’ll be posting bonusLucid proves than an EV company can keep its promises while Xiaomi teams up with Chevrolet and Honda to prove – at least conceptually – that records are made to be broken. audio content from time to time as well, so be sure to follow and subscribe so you don’t miss a minute of Electrek’s high-voltage daily news!

Got news? Let us know!
Drop us a line at tips@electrek.co. You can also rate us on Apple Podcasts and Spotify, or recommend us in Overcast to help more people discover the show!

Read more: Renewables now make up 30% of US utility-scale generating capacity

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This ‘supercharger on wheels’ brings fast charging to you [update]

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This 'supercharger on wheels' brings fast charging to you [update]

Mobile car care company Yoshi Mobility launched a DC fast charging EV mobile unit that it likens to “a supercharger on wheels.”

November 4, 2024 update: Yoshi Mobility will only be charging EVs on the side of the road now – it announced today that it’s selling its fleet fueling operation to EZFill Holdings (Nasdaq: EZFL).

It was originally founded as a direct-to-consumer, mobile fueling business in 2016, but now it’s going to focus on mobile EV charging, virtual vehicle inspections for partners like Uber and Turo, and onsite preventative maintenance.

Bryan Frist, Yoshi Mobility’s CEO & cofounder, said, “By spinning off our fuel business and focusing all of our energy on solving hair-on-fire problems that fleet owners face, we are meeting the changing needs of enterprise customers while making the future of transportation safer, cleaner, and more sustainable.”


May 22, 2024: Yoshi Mobility saw that its existing customers needed mobile EV charging in places where infrastructure has yet to be installed, so the Nashville-based company decided to bring the mountain to Moses.

“We recognized a demand among our customers for convenient daily charging, reliable private charging networks, and proper charging infrastructure to support their fleet vehicles as they transition to electric,” said Dan Hunter, Yoshi Mobility’s chief EV officer and cofounder.

The company says its 240 kW mobile DC fast charger, which can turn “any EV” into a mobile charging unit, is the first fully electric mobile charger available. It can provide multiple charges in a single trip but doesn’t detail how they charge the DC fast charger or who manufactured it. (I asked for more details, and they replied that they won’t disclose client names or the manufacturer of its DC fast charger yet.)

Yoshi is launching its mobile charger on two GM BrightDrop Zevo 600s and will introduce additional vehicles throughout 2024. It aims for full commercialization by Q1 2025. (I wonder if the Zevo 600 ever charges itself? Yes, I asked that too.)

Yoshi Mobility says it’s already deployed its EV charging solutions to service “major OEMs, autonomous vehicle companies, and rideshare operators” across the US. Its initial customers are made up of large EV operators managing “hundreds” of light-duty vehicles requiring up to 1 megawatt of energy per day that don’t yet have grid-connected EV chargers. I’ve asked Yoshi for details of who it’s working with, and will update if they share that info.

The company says pricing is based on location and enterprise charging needs. Once under contract for service, the service will be deployed to US-based customers within 10 days.

To date, Yoshi Mobility has raised more than $60 million, with investments from GM Ventures, Bridgestone, ExxonMobil, and Y-Combinator in Silicon Valley.

Read more: Mercedes-Benz just opened more DC fast chargers at Buc-ee’s in Texas


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Marqeta shares plunge more than 30% on big forecast miss

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Marqeta shares plunge more than 30% on big forecast miss

Marqeta celebrates its initial public offering at the Nasdaq on June 9, 2021.

Source: The Nasdaq

Marqeta shares tumbled more than 30% in extended trading on Monday after the company issued weaker-than-expected guidance for the fourth quarter.

Here’s how the company did compared with Wall Street estimates, based on a survey of analysts by LSEG:

  • Loss per share: 6 cents adjusted vs. a loss of 5 cents expected
  • Revenue: $128 million vs. $128.1 million expected

While third-quarter results showed a slight disappointment on the top and bottom lines, Marqeta’s forecast for the current period was more concerning.

The payment processing firm said revenue in the fourth quarter will increase 10% to 12% from a year earlier. Analysts were looking for growth of more than 17%, according to LSEG.

Marqeta, which primarily functions as a card-issuing platform, attributed the guidance miss to “heightened scrutiny of the banking environment and specific customer program changes.” The company has been struggling for a while, and its stock is now down more than 80% from its peak in 2021, the year it went public. The stock was down 15% for the year prior to the report.

Total processing volume of $74 billion was up more than 30% from a year earlier. Net revenue and gross profit were up 18% and 24%, respectively.

Marqeta’s digital commerce business sells payment technology designed to detect potential fraud and ensure that money is properly routed. It also issues customized physical cards that look like a credit or debit card that can be used for point-of-sale purchases.

The company has been trying to break into the buy now, pay later business with a recently launched product called Marqeta Flex. The service brings BNPL from lenders such as Affirm or Klarna to any credit card wherever Mastercard and Visa are accepted.

“It’s an orchestration layer, but it’s tied to issuing and processing and disputes and chargebacks,” CEO Simon Khalaf told CNBC at Money2020 in Las Vegas last week. “So it is not actually a Wild West in BNPL. It is actually very well established. And there is a reason why a lot of people are jumping to it.”

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Marqeta CEO on Q2 earnings, consumer trends and the end of cash

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