Energy news in general

BUFF

Max68 said:

Not sure if I read it on here or heard it on the radio, but EDF

Put their prices up in France, 5%

Here, put prices up 60%

Can anyone in the know explain, why, how, etc?!

French govt were majority shareholder & now buying the rest of EDF. They also did this just before an election ...
It's political, they will still have to pay for it at some point.

EDF UK is a different company from EDF France.

Max68

BUFF said:

Max68 said:

Not sure if I read it on here or heard it on the radio, but EDF

Put their prices up in France, 5%

Here, put prices up 60%

Can anyone in the know explain, why, how, etc?!

French govt were majority shareholder & now buying the rest of EDF. They also did this just before an election ...
It's political, they will still have to pay for it at some point.

EDF UK is a different company from EDF France.

Thank you.

spot1034

Max68 said:

Not sure if I read it on here or heard it on the radio, but EDF

Put their prices up in France, 5%

Here, put prices up 60%

Can anyone in the know explain, why, how, etc?!

Government subsidy in an election year. The public will still be paying through their taxes.

littleteapot

BUFF said:

Max68 said:

Not sure if I read it on here or heard it on the radio, but EDF

Put their prices up in France, 5%

Here, put prices up 60%

Can anyone in the know explain, why, how, etc?!

French govt were majority shareholder & now buying the rest of EDF. They also did this just before an election ...
It's political, they will still have to pay for it at some point.

EDF UK is a different company from EDF France.

As much as I'm sure the french government would love to cross-subsidise french consumers by over-inflating their prices in the UK, the OFGEM price cap doesn't allow them to do that as they can't charge more than any other supplier.

The only thing they could conceivably do is to wind-up their UK retail arm to cut their losses if the price cap causes them to sell at a loss. I'm not sure exactly what the relationship between EDFs UK retail division and it's electricity generating division (which I believe runs all the remaining active nuclear plants in the UK) is, but I would assume that there is some arrangement here (as well as advance purchase and a decent level of hedging)  which makes EDF UK more financially viable than the now defunct middle-men which had no generating arm or sensible hedging policy and so were at the mercy of day-ahead and season-ahead wholesale prices.

So for once, it would seem that the state owned french monopoly doesn't actually have us over a barrel. Therefore the french government will be borrowing more non-existent money to fund it's below-market consumer enery prices. The only good news for the french government is that if they can safely get most or all of their nuclear plants back to full capacity in the near future, that around 80% of their electricity will be domestically generated by the state-owned company, and so they will only be at the mercy of international wholesale prices for around 20% or less of their electricity demand, even in mid-winter.

BUFF

littleteapot said:

BUFF said:

Max68 said:

Not sure if I read it on here or heard it on the radio, but EDF

Put their prices up in France, 5%

Here, put prices up 60%

Can anyone in the know explain, why, how, etc?!

French govt were majority shareholder & now buying the rest of EDF. They also did this just before an election ...
It's political, they will still have to pay for it at some point.

EDF UK is a different company from EDF France.

As much as I'm sure the french government would love to cross-subsidise french consumers by over-inflating their prices in the UK, 

Who suggested that was their intent? Nobody afaik?
If/when EDF UK returns to profitability (they were not in 2021
 https://www.edfenergy.com/sites/default/files/edf_energy_holdings_limited_fy21_signed_financial_statements_full.pdf) then profits made in the UK could be repatriated to the parent company in France to be used for whatever their board determines.
Meantime, the French govt. decision is costing EDF France far more - tens of billions of euros which will have to be recovered sometime/somehow. All they have done is kick the can down the street a bit -ultimately the chickens will come home to roost. 

p.s. the OFGEM cap doesn't affect commercial or fixed domestic tariffs

littleteapot

BUFF said:

Who suggested that was their intent? Nobody afaik?
If/when EDF UK returns to profitability (they were not in 2021
 https://www.edfenergy.com/sites/default/files/edf_energy_holdings_limited_fy21_signed_financial_statements_full.pdf) then profits made in the UK could be repatriated to the parent company in France to be used for whatever their board determines.
Meantime, the French govt. decision is costing EDF France far more - tens of billions of euros which will have to be recovered sometime/somehow. All they have done is kick the can down the street a bit -ultimately the chickens will come home to roost. 

p.s. the OFGEM cap doesn't affect commercial or fixed domestic tariffs

Never said it was their intent, only an option that may have been considered if if it had been remotely viable. But as stated, they haven't.

I'm guessing that suppliers which both generate non-fossil energy and have a retail sales arm are in a fairly good position to survive this ordeal, as the cost of generating will not have significantly increased but they can sell their surplus (i.e. any energy which hasn't already been bought in advance by their retail division) at much higher prices than usual on the open market.

Companies which primarily generate and supply fossil-fuelled energy might not fare so well. I may have oversimplified this so am happy to be corrected .

Sea_Shell

Worrying reports about the number of household who are already in debt on their energy accounts (or have little or no credit) as we reach the end of summer.

Mstty

Sea_Shell said:

Worrying reports about the number of household who are already in debt on their energy accounts (or have little or no credit) as we reach the end of summer.

I think some of that can be attributed to the SOLR process it certainly saw us end up in a debit from Symbio to our first payments to EON Next and we are pretty much on the ball with these things.

But yes worrying times for those that are not prepared for what is to come.

Eon just posted 1 Billion in profits(I believe) they can handle my little bit of debit 🤣🤣

MattMattMattUK

Sea_Shell said:

Worrying reports about the number of household who are already in debt on their energy accounts (or have little or no credit) as we reach the end of summer.

A lot of that seems to have come from what has been evidenced on here. People have the attitude "I have not used more energy than normal, so I won't put up/won't let the provider put up the monthly Direct Debit" so they have carried on paying an amount too low for their usage. There also seems to be a bunch of people who think that the government handouts will completely insulate them from the price rises, rather than the reality being that for most they will a fraction of the rises. 

Mstty

Martin Lewis just lost a few points this morning.

The energy crisis is not on the scale of the covid pandemic.

However I so agree if there is to be some common ground Sunak/Truss and Boris could put something through now

https://metro.co.uk/video/martin-lewis-fumes-government-inaction-energy-prices-2748215/?ito=vjs-link