German day-ahead baseload cleared 93.78, 71.66, 100.73, 124.58 and 123.04 EUR/MWh across 6 to 10 July, while France cleared 86.97, 89.30, 94.32, 110.02 and 118.6812. Both legs rose together, so the DE-minus-FR spread swung only from -17.64 to +14.56, France the dearer leg on 7 July, a world away from the €71.50 gap the 30 June heat opened when German wind collapsed alone. That spread had already compressed towards €18-26 by 5 July.
The clean spark spread carries this squeeze, not the cross-border one. TTF firmed on the prompt with no matching lift in CCGT running margin, while EUA carbon settled 78.95 EUR/tCO2 on 9 July, roughly flat on the day3. The same margin pressure reached €74 as recently as 30 June. Flat carbon isolates the move as fuel-and-power rather than a carbon-cost shift. Settled baseload stayed moderate at 100 to 125 EUR/MWh, well below the 200-plus evening peaks forecasters flagged, so the pressure reads as a margin squeeze on spark economics, not a power-price explosion.
