Gas Prices Finish Week Higher, Market Nervous Re Australian Developments

European LNG prices rose 2.8% on Friday to EUR 36.51, close to the intraday high of $36.78. Prices finished the week 5.8% higher but below Wednesday’s peak of EUR38.06. While September to date is up 4.2%, price levels remain low. North Asian prices were unchanged on the week and are up 1% this month.

• Supply disruptions have made the market jittery with escalated industrial action at Chevron’s Australian facilities now likely to impact exports, maintenance in Norway continuing longer than expected and an outage in Texas. Soft demand has helped to keep a lid on prices.
• Chevron has announced that full production resumed on September 17 at Wheatstone following a fault on September 14^th. During this time output was at about 80% usual rates and loading continued. LNG deliveries weren’t impacted, according to Reuters.