The market operator

Spain’s Law 8/2015, of 21 May, amending Law 34/1998, of 7 October, on the Hydrocarbons Industry, designates the company MIBGAS S.A. as the Organised Gas Market Operator. For its part, Portaria No. 643/2015, of 21 August, from the Cabinet of Secretário de Estado da Energia of Portugal, authorizes MIBGAS S.A. to exercise the same function in said country, thus configuring the Iberian Gas Market.

MIBGAS, as the Organized Gas Market Operator, is responsible for the management of the Organised Gas Market, being required to undertake the necessary and appropriate duties for its due and proper operations and the economic management of its services, upholding the principles of efficiency, effectiveness, transparency, objectivity, non-discrimination and independence.

It is charged with, amongst others, the following duties:

  • Arrange and accept the registration of prospective Agents.
  • Define and list the products accepted for trading.
  • Receive orders for the purchase and sale of gas, and of whatsoever products involved in the gas supply chain that may at some time be traded, conducting their validation, management and matching, as well as calculating the prices arising from the matching processes.
  • Disclose on a daily basis the prices and volumes traded for each one of the market products, as well as the reference prices and, amongst them, those to be used in the settlements of imbalances.
  • Perform directly, or through a third party, acting as counterparty, the settlements of market processes, invoicing and collection and payment processes, as well as managing market guarantees.
  • Provide each Technical Manager, or those parties as appropriate, with information on the trades made by the Agents in the market, as per the provisions of current legislation.
  • Send to the ACER platform the information required in REMIT that falls within its responsibility.

 

According to Article 15 of Regulation (EU) 1227/2011 REMIT, MIBGAS must notify the relevant public authorities of any behaviour contrary to correct operation of the market, such as any manipulation or attempted manipulation of the market or performance of operations with insider information and any situation that may be anomalous, always taking into account the information available to the Market Operator, for this purpose MIBGAS constantly analyzes the market.