JKM LNG price for April jumps 28%

The benchmark Japan-Korea-Marker (JKM) price for LNG jumped nearly 28% on Friday on fears of disruption to global energy and commodities after Russia's invasion of Ukraine. 

The JKM LNG price for April delivery rose by 27.8% to $37.01 per metric million British thermal units from Thursday's levels, a two-month high. 

Germany on Tuesday halted certification of the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline project, which would double Russia's pipeline export capacity via the Baltic Sea to Germany.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine and the halt of Nord Stream 2 pipeline prompted concern about European gas supply and gas prices jumped by between 50% and 60% on Thursday.

Europe, which has been increasing its use of LNG, is expected to seek as many cargoes as possible, competing with top-importing region Asia.

However, global supply of LNG is tight and most of the volumes of big producers such as Qatar are locked into long-term contracts mostly to Asian buyers.

"If Europe decides to get rid of Russian natural gas and looks for LNG, this will put the global energy market into turmoil, because no producer has that much spare capacity to offset the Russian volumes to Europe," an industry source said.

(Reporting by Marwa Rashad; editing by Nina Chestney and Jason Neely) 

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