Mubasher: Gas future prices dropped by more than 9% on Tuesday, as worries mounted over a global economic slowdown.

At 1:40 pm GMT, Nymex gas futures dropped 9.05% to $3.17 per million British thermal units (MMBtu), but by 2:51 pm GMT, the fall in gas futures narrowed slightly to 8.67% to reach $3.18 MMBtu.          

The decline in gas prices came amid signs of weakness in the global economy, as China’s economic growth marked its slowest pace in 28 years in 2018.

Moreover, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) trimmed its growth forecasts for the world's economy for the second time in three months.

The global lender projected the world's economic growth would be 3.5% for 2019 and 3.6% for 2020, thereby cutting its October projections by 0.2 and 0.1 percentage points, respectively.

Last week, gas futures saw solid gains thanks to forecasts of lower weather temperatures, however, the market's focus would turn to the new forecasts.

Investors are currently awaiting the US Energy Information Administration’s (EIA) weekly data on natural gas inventories for the week ended Friday, 18 January 2019.