Natural Gas Price Week Ahead: Can Henry Hub Hold Above $3 as LNG Outages Tighten Global Supply?

European natural gas prices hovered around levels not seen in three years this week. Iranian missile attacks hit Qatar’s Ras Laffan plant, cutting roughly 17% of the country’s LNG export capacity—a disruption that could linger for as long as five years. The Dutch TTF front-month contract, Europe’s key gas benchmark, finished Friday at about 59 euros per megawatt hour. U.S. Henry Hub gas closed at nearly $3.10 per mmBtu, slipping around 1% for the week following a late-session drop.

European natural gas prices surged Wednesday, with the market rattled by attacks on Iran’s South Pars gas field and fresh Gulf evacuation alerts, stoking anxiety that Qatar’s LNG outage could persist. Dutch TTF futures jumped roughly 6% to 54.66 euros per megawatt hour. Britain’s front-month gas contract advanced 6.7%, according to market data.

Natural gas futures in the U.S. slipped Friday. April Henry Hub contracts, the standard benchmark, wrapped up the day at $3.131 per mmBtu—down a little more than 3%. Forecasters are calling for mostly mild conditions through March, which has traders anticipating softer late-season heating demand.

U.S. natural gas futures slipped on Friday, with April delivery shedding 4.0 cents to settle at $3.193 per million British thermal units. That follows Thursday's finish, the strongest since Feb. 13. The retreat followed news from the Energy Information Administration: marketed U.S. gas production is now projected to reach an all-time high of 118.5 billion cubic feet per day in 2025.

U.S. natural gas futures stuck close to a four-week peak on Thursday, propped up after the latest storage numbers landed and traders kept a wary eye on war-related disruptions hitting LNG flows at the Strait of Hormuz. The front-month Henry Hub contract—the most active—hovered near $3.21 per million British thermal units in early U.S. action, notching a roughly 0.5% bump after the data hit.