(Finance) – In the second quarter of 2024, the variable prices of 12-month electricity contracts practiced by SMEs decreased compared to the previous quarter, while those of natural gas increased slightly. Fixed-price and 24-month contracts, however, continue to be absent due to uncertainty about possible future market trends. This is what emerges from the latest detection of retail energy prices charged to SMEs on the free market, made by Unioncamere and from the Chamber of Commerce of Milan in collaboration with Italian Telematic Commodity Exchange (BMTI) And REF Research.
Prices of multi-hour contracts are falling
The analysis carried out photographs the reduction in the prices of the energy raw material in variable price contracts and the absence of fixed price and 24-month contracts, following the strong uncertainties that characterize the forecasts on the trends of the electricity and gas markets for the coming months. In detail, multi-hourly contracts, i.e. contracts that provide for different prices depending on the 3 time slots, for companies with consumption up to 50 MWh/year of annual duration at variable price starting in April 2024, present levels of fees that are around 115.11 euros/MWh in the daytime time slot (F1), 130.83 euros/MWh in the evening time slot (F2) and 108.41 euros/MWh in the night time slot (F3), with variations compared to the previous quarter ranging between -18% for the F1 time slot and -3% for the F2. On the natural gas front, in the second quarter of 2024, the price of annual variable fee contracts increased slightly compared to the previous quarter (+4.5% quarterly) and amounted to 49.25 eurocents/smc for a consumption profile of up to 50 thousand/mc per year. In general, energy and gas prices are experiencing a recovery phase after the significant upward fluctuations that characterized 2022 in particular, due to tensions on the wholesale markets that followed the phase of collapse in demand during the pandemic period with the consequent sharp reduction in prices.
The soft landing of 2024
The first half of 2024 for the global economy ended in line with the trends of 2023 and not all the expected improvements in the scenario have occurred. The decline in inflation was the main development, mainly due to the reduction of tensions in supply chains, although the increase in labor costs has affected the prices of services. In Italy, 2024 marks the first year of growth in real wages after three years of contraction and employment has proven resilient despite the economic slowdown, supporting household incomes. This creates the conditions for a recovery in consumption which, however, is expected to occur gradually, with the first signs visible only in the second half of the year and then in 2025.