Gazprom case. The Il Sole 24 comment | ISPI
Salta al contenuto principale

Form di ricerca

  • ISTITUTO
  • PALAZZO CLERICI
  • MEDMED

  • login
  • EN
  • IT
Home
  • ISTITUTO
  • PALAZZO CLERICI
  • MEDMED
  • Home
  • RICERCA
    • OSSERVATORI
    • Asia
    • Digitalizzazione e Cybersecurity
    • Europa e Governance Globale
    • Geoeconomia
    • Medio Oriente e Nord Africa
    • Radicalizzazione e Terrorismo Internazionale
    • Russia, Caucaso e Asia Centrale
    • Infrastrutture
    • PROGRAMMI
    • Africa
    • America Latina
    • Global Cities
    • Migrazioni
    • Relazioni transatlantiche
    • Religioni e relazioni internazionali
    • Sicurezza energetica
    • DataLab
  • ISPI SCHOOL
  • PUBBLICAZIONI
  • EVENTI
  • PER IMPRESE
    • cosa facciamo
    • Incontri su invito
    • Conferenze di scenario
    • Formazione ad hoc
    • Future Leaders Program
    • I Nostri Soci
  • ANALISTI

  • Home
  • RICERCA
    • OSSERVATORI
    • Asia
    • Digitalizzazione e Cybersecurity
    • Europa e Governance Globale
    • Geoeconomia
    • Medio Oriente e Nord Africa
    • Radicalizzazione e Terrorismo Internazionale
    • Russia, Caucaso e Asia Centrale
    • Infrastrutture
    • PROGRAMMI
    • Africa
    • America Latina
    • Global Cities
    • Migrazioni
    • Relazioni transatlantiche
    • Religioni e relazioni internazionali
    • Sicurezza energetica
    • DataLab
  • ISPI SCHOOL
  • PUBBLICAZIONI
  • EVENTI
  • PER IMPRESE
    • cosa facciamo
    • Incontri su invito
    • Conferenze di scenario
    • Formazione ad hoc
    • Future Leaders Program
    • I Nostri Soci
  • ANALISTI

Gazprom case. The Il Sole 24 comment

Inviato da ISPI il Lun, 11/05/2015 - 00:52
Domenica, 10 maggio, 2015
Energy comments

Sissi Bellomo - Il Sole 24 Ore, 22/04/2015

One of the charges the European Commission brought against Gazprom in its antitrust case is that it allegedly practiced an “unfair pricing policy” towards some customers that were thus forced to pay more than due for gas supplies.

What is a “fair” gas price anyway? The EU Competition Commission itself struggles somewhat to explain it. The issue, it says, is “partly” related to the price formulae used in Russian long-term supply contracts. By indexing gas to a basket of oil products, these formulae "unduly favoured Gazprom over its customers” in five Eastern European countries: Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland. But these are not the only EU countries where Russian gas is still – at least partly – indexed to oil. Similar pricing systems are used (with no scandal, until now) by other relevant suppliers as well, among which one finds Algeria and, until a few years ago, Norway.

Probably it is an obsolete system. But is it also “unfair”, or even evidence of an abuse of dominant market position?

The European Commission makes it clear that it “does not consider that indexing a product’s price to oil prices or any other product is in itself illegal”. It also “does not take issue with the fact that gas prices are different in different countries”. Its conclusion that Gazprom prices might be unfair (with respect to some clients) hinges on comparisons “to a number of different benchmarks, such as Gazprom’s costs, prices in different geographic markets or market prices”.

Admittedly, for many years free market prices – or spot prices – have been lower, sometimes a lot lower, than contractual prices for gas, whether sold by Gazprom or by other suppliers. At one point, though, oil prices collapsed, losing more than half of its value in just a few months. With a time lag, (contractual) gas prices also started to fall as a consequence, to the point they became competitive – if not cheaper – with spot market gas prices.

While it is easy to blame Gazprom for hindering cross-border gas sales or for blackmailing some customers in order to obtain preferential treatment – for instance by making gas supply conditional upon investment in a pipeline – allegations about pricing policies could be vulnerable to counterclaims.

Back to Energy Watch homepage

Tags: 
gazprom
european commission
eu
natural gas

The ISPI Energy Watch is an open forum for discussion and research on energy and energy-related issues. 
Discussion is going to take place mainly on the Energy Watch Blog, where we would like to comment and stimulate, on a weekly basis, debate about hot topics emerged from the news. Research contributions on specific energy-related issues will be published on the Energy Watch Library with the goal of collecting, on a monthly basis, papers with a deeper level of analysis aimed at supporting policy makers and public opinion’s awareness. 
The ISPI Energy Watch welcomes and supports independent written contributions both on the Blog and on the Library in order to promote a lively debate among different opinions and expertises. Contributions and proposals should be in English and should be submitted for review to the Coordination Committee.

 

Contacts: osservatorioenergia@ispionline.it
Twitter: @ISPIenergy

 Who we are

Sections

  • Energy Agenda
  • Energy comments
  • From Russia with energy
  • Weekly Reading List

Events

SEGUICI E RICEVI LE NOSTRE NEWS

Iscriviti alla newsletter Scopri ISPI su Telegram

Chi siamo - Lavora con noi - Analisti - Contatti - Ufficio stampa - Privacy

ISPI (Istituto per gli Studi di Politica Internazionale) - Palazzo Clerici (Via Clerici 5 - 20121 Milano) - P.IVA IT02141980157