Moldovagaz will not be able to make an advance payment to Gazprom in August

The company “Moldovagaz” will not be able to make an advance payment to “Gazprom” for gas supplies in August, as it does not have enough funds for this, told NewsMaker publication Vadim Cheban, chairman of the board of the company.

“I can say right away that we will not be able to pay. We will close July, but we won’t be able to pay the advance payment for August, that’s for sure,” Cheban said. He noted that the company had already asked for a delay in payments, but had not yet received a response. Cheban himself hopes that in the fourth quarter a different pricing formula will be applied, due to which the purchase price will decrease, as prescribed in the contract.

When asked what would happen ifGazprom”will not grant a deferment, Ceban did not answer, he only said that the shareholders should take into account the fact that such a situation in the company arose due to the conditions of the Moldovan legislation.

“With the existing methodology [расчета тарифов на газ] I don’t see how we can ask for a raise. In this situation, even if we ask to increase the tariff, ANRE will still approve the tariff at the average annual price,” he added.

On August 4, the Moldovan National Energy Regulatory Agency (ANRE) raised gas prices from 18.62 lei to 23 lei per cubic meter. The tariff began to operate from August 1. Moldovagaz, in turn, asked to raise the price to almost 30 lei per cubic meter to cover tariff deviations. The cost of gas purchases in August amounted to $1,458 per 1,000 cubic meters, it is expected that by September the price will rise to $1,692 per 1,000 cubic meters. ANRE, in its calculations, proceeded from the average purchase price in 2022, which is $899 per 1,000 cubic meters.

Moldovagaz is a Russian-Moldovan company with about 5,000 employees. It is engaged in the transportation of natural and liquefied gas, the construction of gas supply networks, as well as gasification and maintenance of the gas industry in Moldova. Its majority stake belongs to the Russian “Gazprom”.

In October last year, Moldovagaz andGazprom» extended the gas supply contract for five years. According to the formula proposed by Chisinau, the price of gas is partly linked to the oil product basket and partly to spot gas prices in Europe. Thus, in November, the purchase price of Russian gas for Moldova was $450 per 1,000 cubic meters. m. Under the contract that expired in September, Moldova paid for gas an average of $148 per 1,000 cubic meters. m.

Under the agreement, Moldovagaz also undertook to pay for gas for the previous month and make an advance payment for the current month by the 20th day of each month. The company twice – in November and January – received a warning from Gazprom about the suspension of supplies due to late payments, but in both cases it was avoided. Money to pay the debt was allocated from the budget of Moldova.

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