The price of natural gas bought by NJSC Naftogaz Ukrainy from European suppliers, which is to be delivered in May, is $25-30 per 1,000 cubic meters lower than the price stipulated in the contract with Gazprom, Naftogaz Chief Commercial Officer Yuriy Vitrenko said.
“We’ve completed buying planned volumes of imported gas in May. It is from Europe. The price of gas from Europe to be delivered in May was lower by $25-30 from the price under the contract with Gazprom in the second quarter of 2017,” he wrote on Facebook on April 13.
Vitrenko recalled that Naftogaz had not been buying gas from Gazprom for more than 500 days.
The CCO specified that if purchased with delivery in May, the difference of the price from the possible purchases from Gazprom was at least $21 million, which brought amounts of contracted gas to about 750 million cubic meters.
“As you can see, gas from Europe is cheaper than from Russia, and we save while buying not from Russia,” he said.
He stressed that the terms of the purchase from Gazprom for Naftogaz were still unacceptable, because the Ukrainian company’s payments could be used to set off “take-or-pay” liabilities without supplying gas.
Vitrenko added that Naftogaz bought gas from leading European companies for May, using a loan from international banks against a World Bank guarantee at an interest rate of 3%. (Interfax-Ukraine/Business World Magazine)