What is Natural Gas?
Discover the world of Natural Gas, its global impact, and how to access NATGAS CFD data through our Python-powered API.
Natural Gas is a critical fossil fuel and a popular instrument in the commodity markets. If you are new to commodities, this article will help you understand this energy resource briefly and help you get NATGAS CFD data through a step-by-step Python-based tutorial.
Stay tuned to reveal the significance of Natural Gas for its various applications and as a financial instrument to speculate by obtaining market data from us.
Understanding Natural Gas
Natural Gas is a product of fossil fuel decomposition. It lurks deep beneath the Earth alongside coal and crude oil. Its primary component is Methane (CH4), accompanied by higher alkanes and trace gasses like carbon dioxide and hydrogen sulfide.
Its clean-burning properties, emitting fewer greenhouse gasses and pollutants than coal and oil, have made it a preferred choice for reducing carbon emissions.
Important Natural Gas Facts and Figures You Should Know
Natural Gas Unit
British Thermal Unit (BTU) and Cubic Meters
Global Dry Natural Gas Production
In the first half of 2023, the average dry Natural Gas production was about 2.89 billion cubic meters/day. In 2022, the global production was 4,089 billion cubic meters.
Highest Natural Gas-producing Countries
- The United States: 914.6 billion cubic meters,
- Russia: 638.5 billion cubic meters,
- Iran: 250.8 billion cubic meters.
Top Natural Gas-Consuming Countries
- The United States: 832 billion cubic meters,
- Russia: 411.1 billion cubic meters,
- China: 330.6 billion cubic meters.
Natural Gas as a Financial Instrument
Natural Gas is a preferred commodity to trade for many institutional investors and traders alike. Understanding the natural gas market dynamics and staying updated with the demand and supply curve is critical.
Moreover, it is a globally traded commodity with a substantial liquefied natural gas (LNG) market. You can get Natural Gas Futures in leading exchanges like the New York Mercantile Exchange (NYMEX) and Intercontinental Exchange (ICE). It is traded with NATGAS as its ticker symbol.
This international trade landscape presents opportunities to capitalize on Natural Gas price variations across different regions.
Why is Natural Gas a Popular Commodity?
Natural Gas has been gaining popularity as a financial instrument to trade in recent years. Let’s briefly take you through the reasons why it is a popular commodity:
Growing Demand for Cleaner Fossil Fuel
We are in the ‘sustainable development’ and environmentally conscious era. As Natural Gas burns cleaner, producing very few greenhouse gasses, it is preferred over other fossil fuels, like coal and crude oil.
Evolving Technology
We have seen technological advancements and transformation.
- Natural Gas extraction by leveraging Hydraulic fracturing or fracking technology
- Conversion into LNG by freezing to cryogenic temperature for easy storage and shipping
- Compressing to produce CNG (Compressed Natural Gas) for easy transportation
These techniques help cater to the growing demand for Natural Gas by simplifying its extraction, storage, and transportation.
Liquidity
As the physical utilization and speculation on Natural Gas grow, we can see a massive trading volume on both the buying and selling sides. This increasing popularity of the commodity makes it a liquid asset. Traders can set market entry and exit strategies through in-depth market analysis.
Volatility
Though Natural Gas prices are usually steady, sometimes, we experience volatility. Traders can make the best of price fluctuations by making informed decisions.
For instance, Henry Hub Natural Gas Spot Price — a benchmark in the US, was $7/MMBTu in November 2022, and it raised to about $3.52/MMBtu next month — a 49.71% decline in a month. Currently, it is at $2.48/MMBtu.
Growth Prospects
Many prominent companies in the energy sector are researching and investing in the extraction, shipping, and utilization of Natural Gas for various purposes. So, the commodity has bright growth prospects in the future.
Natural Gas Trading Hours
TraderMade offers details of CFD trading hours for various CFD instruments, including Natural Gas. The trading starts on Sundays at 10 PM GMT and ends on Fridays at 8:45 PM GMT. It has a break from 9 PM to 10 PM GMT.
You can take a look at trading hours: https://www.tradermade.com/cfd-opening-times
Why is NATGAS CFD Data Critical?
As Natural Gas price is volatile and affected by many factors, a thorough analysis is the key to making informed decisions. Similarly, staying updated with the live streaming CFD updates and other factors influencing NATGAS price movements is also essential.
TraderMade helps you make wise decisions by providing live and historical CFD data via CFD API. Our detailed CFD Data Documentation and technological tutorials help you fetch CFD data for analysis. Similarly, we offer CFD live prices for NATGAS to help you get real-time price updates crucial to your market entry and exit decisions.
Also Read: What is CFD Data? Why Use CFD API?
How to Get NATGAS CFD Data via our CFD API Using Python
This short tutorial helps us understand how to access Natural Gas (NATGAS) data using TraderMade’s REST API with Python and SDK (Software Development Kit).
Firstly, we need to sign up for an account with TraderMade and obtain our unique API key. The key will allow us to access real-time Natural Gas data. We can also visit PyPI for more information.
Let’s install the Python SDK. Just execute the following command from the terminal (python 3 is needed) or Google Colaboratory.
pip install tradermadeOnce ‘tradermade’ is installed, we need to open an IDE to run the following commands.
import tradermade as tmWe can now set the API key that enables us to get our data.
tm.set_rest_api_key("api_key")Let us run the below command to retrieve live data for Natural gas (NATGAS).
tm.live(currency='NATGAS',fields=["bid", "mid", "ask"])Viola! We have our output.
[{"index":0,"instrument":"NATGASUSD","timestamp":"2023–09–12 08:11:27","bid":2.846,"mid":2.8495,"ask":2.853}]If you need more assistance, please don’t hesitate to contact us via live chat or email support@tradermade.com.
