Natural gas is in free fall – down by up to 21%

up to 21% off Since early Thursday morning (24/8) he has been recording prices in his contracts natural gasat its lowest since March 2022, with optimism returning about the outcome of the talks.

Specifically, according to what he conveysI bloomberg, Workers’ representatives at the Woodside Energy Group Ltd plant are considering an “strong offer” from the company after negotiations wrapped up on Wednesday night, and already the market is pushing prices lower, after increases in recent weeks.

in this climate Dutch Gas Contract (TTF)It is the reference contract for Europe, and moves at 31.90 euros per megawatt hour, while it touched earlier 29.50 euros.

It is noteworthy that natural gas recorded a jump on Monday 8/21 18% to 42.90 euros per megawatt hour in the first trading hour.

The “difficult winter” scenarios remain

according bloomberg, Although natural gas prices are still well below highs seen in about a year, volatility this winter could mean higher bills for home heating and home energy customers, as well as for large-scale natural gas consumers including the steel, fertilizer, and ceramics industries.

Even with 90% of European gas reserves full, Europe needs a steady flow liquefied natural gas from global markets. In this context, a prolonged disruption of supplies from Australia, which supplies Asia, could push supplies from the United States or Qatar to other markets, cutting off supplies to Europe.

Even if an agreement is reached in the talks with Woodside, the talks conducted by Chevron will not produce any results. Unions at two LNG terminals in Australia are still ongoing. A stalemate there could jeopardize about 24.5 million tons of annual production capacity, or about 5 percent of global LNG, according to Bloomberg.