Day-ahead electricity prices across Southeast Europe diverged on Thursday, with Serbia and Montenegro recording double-digit increases while Hungary stayed among the region’s most expensive markets. Hungary’s HUPX day-ahead price fell by €9.5/MWh to €196.57/MWh. Romania settled slightly higher at €196.82/MWh.
Bulgaria and Greece cleared at €192.88/MWh, while Slovenia reached €191.46/MWh and Croatia settled at €190.55/MWh. Serbia’s SEEPEX rose by €11.9/MWh to €184.92/MWh, and Montenegro’s BELEN gained €12.7/MWh to €184.47/MWh. Albania moved lower, dropping €30.2/MWh to €173.67/MWh, close to North Macedonia at €173.49/MWh.
Germany drops while Hungary stays near the top of regional pricing
The spread widened as Germany’s price fell by €30.1/MWh to €133.62/MWh, leaving Hungary nearly €63/MWh above the German market. Italy remained the highest-priced market in the regional dataset at €212.46/MWh. The German-Hungarian gap widened even as Central Europe flows into the region strengthened.
Combined imports from Austria and Slovakia into the Hungary-Slovenia area increased by around 795 MW to 3,832 MW, while total regional net imports edged up to 2,730 MW. Average regional demand rose by 226 MW to 33,443 MW, while generation fell. Hydro output increased to 5,212 MW and wind rose to 1,360 MW, but solar generation declined to 6,642 MW and gas-fired output fell to 4,960 MW.
Coal generation was broadly stable at 6,989 MW. The data point to Thursday’s price separation being driven less by a regional supply shortage than by cross-border flows and congestion between markets.
Serbia and Montenegro support higher prices through cross-border trading
Serbia remained a net importer with average generation of about 3,174 MW against consumption of 3,676 MW, leaving a deficit of around 502 MW. Commercial flows from Serbia towards Hungary increased sharply despite lower Serbian electricity demand compared with the previous day. Base-load Serbia-to-Hungary flows reached around 371 MW versus 56 MW a day earlier.
Off-peak flows averaged about 744 MW as Serbia continued importing from Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia and Bulgaria while sending power north toward Hungary’s higher-priced market. This trading pattern helped support SEEPEX at €184.92/MWh even as domestic demand declined.
Montenegro showed similar exposure to a higher-priced neighbouring market as it remained a net importer of around 106 MW. Commercial schedules indicated exports of about 345 MW towards Italy, where prices were almost €28/MWh above BELEN at the time of settlement. Montenegro was meanwhile drawing electricity from Bosnia and Herzegovina and Serbia.
Import dependence tightens balances in Hungary and Romania
Hungary’s domestic balance tightened despite the fall in HUPX as consumption rose to about 4,749 MW while domestic generation fell to roughly 3,482 MW. Net imports increased to around 1,267 MW under those conditions.
Romania was also import-dependent with consumption rising to about 5,898 MW while generation slipped to around 4,719 MW, leaving net imports of about 1,180 MW. Romanian flows included substantial imports from Hungary and Bulgaria, helping keep OPCOM almost fully aligned with HUPX.
Bulgaria remained a sizeable exporter with generation of around 5,001 MW against consumption of 3,952 MW, while Greece also stayed in surplus. The resulting structure left Hungary and Romania close to €197/MWh, Bulgaria, Greece, Slovenia and Croatia around €190-193/MWh, Serbia and Montenegro near €185/MWh, and Albania and North Macedonia below €174/MWh.
Forward pricing remains firm alongside spot spread
Hungarian forward prices also remained firm with October power indicated at €200/MWh. The October Hungary-Germany forward spread stood at around €44.50/MWh, below Thursday’s much wider spot differential between the two markets.
The spot market continued to reflect a Central European bottleneck as cheaper German electricity did not fully compress Hungarian prices while the Hungarian premium pulled additional power north from Serbia. For SEE traders, persistent congestion was flagged as a risk that wide internal spreads could remain even if regional generation improves by keeping price formation tied to available cross-border capacity rather than a single uniform regional supply-demand balance.
