Snapshot - 25 September 2026
Gas and power both moved higher on Thursday, then reversed hard this morning. A fourth consecutive fall in Norwegian pipeline nominations, with flows into Britain dropping to barely a tenth of normal levels, pushed NBP day-ahead and the whole front of the curve up by around 4 per cent, with prompt gas settling near the top of the 180s in pence per therm. Power followed, with UK day-ahead baseload settling in the low £160s/MWh and Winter-26 in the low £150s/MWh. This morning the market has given back most of those gains on renewed optimism that the Strait of Hormuz may reopen in phases, with the front winter contract offered around 9.5 p/therm below yesterday's close.
The underlying picture is more mixed than either day's move suggests. European storage is close to 70 per cent full, well short of normal for the time of year, and the winter supply season formally begins next Thursday. Norwegian nominations are recovering as maintenance winds down, but an unplanned outage and an extension at Troll are holding back the improvement. Temperatures are forecast above seasonal norm into early October, which is bearish for demand, though softer wind is lifting the call on gas-fired generation. Almost all of the curve's risk premium sits in the five delivery months from November to March, with prices falling away sharply from April onwards.
Across the wider complex, crude extended its gains on continuing Middle East disruption, with Brent settling above $105/bbl and holding a widening premium to WTI. Coal was broadly steady. Carbon firmed in both schemes on compliance buying ahead of a spot expiry, with UK allowances rising faster than European ones and the discount between the two narrowing. Asian LNG benchmarks edged higher and retain a small premium over European hubs, keeping cargo direction finely balanced. Sterling was marginally weaker but not enough to matter for import costs.
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