The main index rose this month as buyng pressure came back into the futures market. 

 

Three large CFDs are excluded from the indexes because they are ten years in length or more, and therefore are exempt from price disclosure under the Electricity Industry Participation Code. 

 

Hydro storage remains very healthy for this time of year, but we do note that some forecasters are reporting an increased probability of entering a strong La Nina phase in the near future, which typically reduces the amount of westerly rain falling in the catchments of the big South Is hydro lakes. If this develops - and this is only an 'if' - then the lakes could come under pressure from mid-summer onward into spring. 

 

In the meantime, the storm that went through on Sunday and Monday bought a lot of rain to the southern high country and the snow is litterally pouring off the mountains, so we can expect good inflows to continue for most of the next week as this is an early melt 

 

Earlier this month, futures contracts were made available for all four quarters in 2025, and they are lower than 2024, which is lower than 2023, and so on. 

 

But the 2025 futures prices are considerably higher than one would expect if the Tiwai Pt aluminium smelter does indeed close in 2025. Which suggests that futures traders in aggregate believe that it will either stay, or will be replaced by a massive green hydrogen project. 

 

On the former point, it is amazing how high aluminium prices now, in 2021, appear to be projected into the future, to the point where they are assumed to be high enough in 2025 to convince the smelter's owners to pay a higher price for electricity (than they pay now) and to stay open for at least another year.