Poland Promotes Liquidity with National Gas Market

Poland steps up its attempts to promote gas market liberalization, enabling trading companies and large customers to trade directly on the exchange market.

“The new regulations allow us to introduce market makers whose role will be to ensure liquidity. We also see interest in operating on the exchange among foreign players,” Ireneusz ‎Łazor, President of the Polish Power Exchange, said in a note released on Monday.

The Polish Financial Supervision Authority approved the direct access to the gas market as of November 1, in the wake of enactment of the amended Energy Law, which also introduced mandatory public gas trading. 

At the moment, only 13 entities are entitled to operate on the POLPX gas market. The other players are allowed to intervene into the market through brokerage houses. 

‘Based on Energy Regulatory Office figures for the end of August, there were 124 entities holding gas trade licences, and 35 energy companies were actively participating in natural gas trade,’ reads the note released by the Polish Power Exchange.

The cumulative volume of natural gas trade at POLPX after the first three quarters of 2013 totalled 686,933 MWh, including 248,407 MWh on the spot market and 438,526 MWh on the forward market. In total, over 800 transactions were made.