Skip to content
You can now search across every topic, entity and event.What's new
Iran Conflict 2026
12AUG

Spark stays negative, French edge erodes

4 min read
14:52UTC

TTF settled EUR 62.4/MWh on 22 July and EUA carbon broke EUR 83.20, both power-clearing inputs still rising as the France-Germany day-ahead discount compressed to EUR 5.37.

ConflictDeveloping
Key takeaway

The negative German spark now holds across sessions, and France's day-ahead discount has shrunk to EUR 5.37/MWh.

TTF settled EUR 62.4/MWh on Wednesday 22 July and held EUR 61.9 into Thursday 23 July 1, its highest since the US-Israel-Iran war began and up from EUR 59.135 on 20 July . EUA carbon broke a fresh high of EUR 83.20/tonne on 22 July 2, up from EUR 80.14 on 16 July . Both inputs the 20 July inversion turned on are still climbing.

German day-ahead had reached EUR 156 on 16 July, and the spark turned briefly positive ; a week on, gas and carbon have pushed back past it. At roughly 0.2 tonnes of CO2 per MWh, EUA at EUR 83 alone adds about EUR 16.6/MWh to a CCGT's marginal cost before the gas leg, so carbon, not gas alone, drives the inversion this week. The spark reverses only if German day-ahead rises to meet the gas-and-carbon stack, and the 21 to 23 July tape does not show it.

That same German gas-set stack compressed the France-Germany day-ahead spread to EUR 5.37/MWh on 23 July, Germany clearing EUR 117.65 against France's EUR 112.28 3. On 30 June the spread held around EUR 71.50 even after French output cuts ; three weeks of gas-and-carbon strength have closed almost all of it. EDF's reactors are running, yet TTF at EUR 62 plus EUA at EUR 83 lifts the German marginal price above France's nuclear-set floor. The German stack, not the French fleet, sets continental clearing this week.

Deep Analysis

In plain English

European power stations that burn gas have to pay two separate costs: the gas itself, and a permit for every tonne of carbon dioxide they release, called an EUA (EU Allowance). The EU deliberately makes fewer of these permits available each year to push emissions down, so their price tends to rise over time regardless of what else is happening in energy markets. This week both costs, gas and carbon, hit fresh highs on the same day. Most coverage focuses on gas, driven by tension near the Strait of Hormuz, a narrow shipping route for Middle Eastern oil and gas. But the carbon permit price is climbing for its own separate reason, a long-planned EU policy to squeeze supply, and that part of the story would keep pushing power costs up even if the Hormuz situation calmed down tomorrow.

Deep Analysis
Root Causes

The EU ETS cap contracts on a fixed annual schedule set by the Fit for 55 package, roughly 4.3% a year through the current phase, independent of any single week's gas news. That mechanical tightening means EUA has been drifting toward higher clearing levels across 2026 regardless of the Hormuz situation, and 22 July's fresh high sits on that pre-existing trend rather than being caused by the same shipping risk moving TTF.

The two legs are correlated in this instance mainly because both cleared on the same trading session under the same general risk-on tone, not because carbon markets are structurally exposed to a Gulf chokepoint. Treating the EUR 83.20 print as confirmation of gas-driven contagion into carbon risks missing the cap-tightening trend that predates 20 July entirely.

What could happen next?
  • Meaning

    EUA's contribution to negative spark economics is running on the ETS's own multi-year cap-reduction schedule, not on Hormuz shipping risk, so the two drivers can diverge even though they moved together this week.

    Immediate · Reported
  • Consequence

    A Hormuz de-escalation that brings TTF down would not automatically restore a positive spark spread if EUA continues climbing on its scheduled cap trajectory.

    Medium term · Reported
  • Risk

    Desks reading the spread as a pure gas-risk trade may be under-hedged against the carbon leg's independent structural rise.

    Short term · Reported
First Reported In

Update #29 · Germany's caverns stop buying gas

investing.com· 23 Jul 2026
Read original
Different Perspectives
Anwar Gargash, UAE presidential diplomatic adviser
Anwar Gargash, UAE presidential diplomatic adviser
Gargash warned the region cannot stay trapped between "neither war nor peace", naming the stalemate itself as unsustainable for a Gulf state hosting US forces and absorbing the shipping-risk cost without being party to either the strike decisions or the corridor talks.
Shipping and insurance underwriters
Shipping and insurance underwriters
War-risk premiums are still set against an active blockade and a fatal Bab el-Mandeb attack with an unresolved vessel identity. A disabling strike and a diplomatic "advanced" claim pulling in opposite directions gives underwriters no single signal to reprice cover against.
Pakistan and Qatar (Oman corridor mediators)
Pakistan and Qatar (Oman corridor mediators)
Pakistan's defence minister said matters are "shaping up in favor of peace" on Hormuz and a Qatari spokesperson called the Iran-Oman reopening talks advanced. Both are publicly ahead of Tehran's own security council, which has just disowned the deal's significance.
United States Central Command / President Trump
United States Central Command / President Trump
CENTCOM confirmed a helicopter strike disabled a container ship that tried to evade the blockade, and Trump said the US "totally controls" the Strait of Hormuz. Washington is treating evasion of the blockade as grounds for disabling fire rather than the redirection tactic CENTCOM used through July.
Mohsen Rezaei, Iran's Supreme National Security Council
Mohsen Rezaei, Iran's Supreme National Security Council
Rezaei told China's ambassador Hormuz reopens only when the US ends the war and unblocks Iran's funds, and that the Oman transit deal "will have no impact" on that decision. He is drawing a hard line between the technical corridor track and the political settlement his council controls.
Yemen's internationally recognised government and affected communities
Yemen's internationally recognised government and affected communities
SABA reported at least 17 soldiers killed at Saudi-backed camps in eastern Yemen as tanker use of Bab el-Mandeb fell. The fighting adds civilian and supply risks to a route ships use when Hormuz is unsafe.