OREANDA-NEWS. October 29, 2014. Deputy Head of the Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS Russia), Anatoly Golomolzin, discussed antimonopoly regulation of domestic gas market at the Round Table on the “Concept of Developing Domestic Gas Market: Tasks and Solutions” organized by “Russian Gas Society” Non-Profit Partnership.

Currently there are no market pricing mechanisms: netback price, an index formed through organized exchange trading, off-exchange index formed by transactions registration, unified transportation tariffs.

“Independent companies have special tariffs for gas transportation while “Gazprom” includes the transportation price in the gas price. There should be unified tariff-setting for all companies, including “Gazprom””, pointed out Anatoly Golomolzin.

Deputy Head of FAS reminded that the first exchange trading with natural gas would take place on 24 October at St Petersburg Mercantile Exchange:

“Since 2015 around 10% of the overall supplies of natural gas to the domestic market will be sold through exchange – more than 30 billion cubic meters of natural gas per year”.

According to Anatoly Golomolzin, it will help shape competitive gas market.

As a result of introducing exchange gas trading, we expect to obtain spot prices indices for a month, ten days (week) and a day (two) ahead. Off-exchange transactions will also be registered at exchange – it will facilitate developing off-exchange price indices and will enable us to see the objective price picture of the market”.