Introduction

A paper published in April 2007 questioned the continued rationale of the linkage of Continental European long term contract gas prices to oil product prices.1 It concluded that the logic of linking gas prices to those of (mainly) oil products had largely disappeared in the major European gas markets. In the following two years, energy and non-energy events have begun to exert substantial pressure on the oil linkage mechanism. The global economic and financial crisis, which began in late 2008, has significantly depressed European energy and gas demand. Substantial new LNG supply ...