Dutch and British wholesale gas prices were largely stable on Friday as Norwegian flows steadied and low demand allowed for storage refilling, but wider market tightness continued to support prices.
The benchmark Dutch front-month contract at the TTF hub (TRNLTTFMc1) was up by 0.26 euro at 35.18 euros per megawatt hour (MWh) or $11.68/mmBtu by 0816 GMT, LSEG data showed.
With the June contract expiring on Friday, the market focus is now switching to July, consultancy Auxilione said in its daily market report.
The Dutch July contract (TRNLTTFMc2) edged up by 0.14 euro to 35.40 euros/MWh.
The British front-month contract (TRGBNBPMc1) was down 1.21 pence at 83.25 p/therm, while the weekend contract (TRGBNBPWE) was down 1.20 pence at 82.30 p/therm.
Prices are now largely back to the levels seen before a bout of Norwegian maintenance that started last week, LSEG analyst Saku Jussila said.
Total Norwegian export nominations are down slightly from 296 million cubic metres/day (mcm/d) on Thursday to 292 mcm/d on Friday morning, data from infrastructure operators Gassco showed.
TTF gas prices increased almost 10% in May driven by concerns around tariffs, weather, and further delay risk for upcoming liquefied natural gas (LNG) projects, analysts at Jefferies Equities Research said in monthly report.
North-west European gas demand fell 7% or 33 mcm/day over the past eight weeks, they said.
Injections into European gas storage have been above the average seen over the last five years, although overall filling levels are 12 billion cubic metres (bcm), or 19%, below the 5-year average, the analysts added.
“We continue to see a tight market in ’25, due to higher European injection demand, lost Russian pipeline imports (~15bcm/yr), and LNG project delays,” they said.
European gas storages sites are currently 47.2% full, data from Gas Infrastructure Europe showed.
In the European carbon market, the benchmark contract (CFI2Zc1) was up 0.20 euro at 71.14 euros a metric ton.
Source: Reuters