France’s current electricity oversupply, driven by the return of nuclear capacity and slower-than-expected domestic electrification, is often viewed as a Western European issue with limited impact on Southeast Europe (SEE). In reality, French price dynamics increasingly ripple eastward, reshaping spreads, flow directions, and congestion patterns that directly affect Hungary, Croatia, Romania, and ultimately Serbia and the Western Balkans.
When French baseload output exceeds domestic demand, prices on the French market compress sharply, often pulling down neighbouring zones in Germany, Switzerland, and Italy. This price pressure then propagates eastward. Germany, as a major transit market, plays a critical role: when German prices soften due to French exports, the effect flows into Austria and Hungary, lowering entry prices into the SEE system during specific hours. The outcome is not uniform convergence, but rather a time-specific reconfiguration of spreads.
Hungary is the first SEE market to absorb these signals. As a highly interconnected hub, Hungarian day-ahead and intraday prices increasingly reflect Western European fundamentals during low-demand or high-nuclear periods in France. This influences flows toward Serbia and Croatia, particularly during night-time baseload hours when Hungarian prices soften relative to Balkan markets still supported by coal or hydro marginal units.
For Serbia, this dynamic introduces a new layer of price dependency. French oversupply does not translate into constant cheap imports, but into episodic price compression windows. Traders capable of identifying these windows—often overnight or on weekends—can access cheaper power through Hungary. Those relying on static assumptions about regional pricing risk mispositioning. Over time, these patterns erode the traditional dominance of local baseload plants in setting Serbian prices during off-peak hours.
Croatia experiences a dual effect. On one hand, lower Central European prices reduce import costs during low-demand periods. On the other, Croatia’s growing renewable penetration means it increasingly exports during high-wind or high-solar hours, sometimes into markets already saturated by French-driven surplus. This intensifies intraday volatility and compresses margins unless storage or flexible exports are available.
Romania occupies a structurally different position. With its own nuclear baseload, Romania competes rather than complements French output during low-demand periods. When Western European prices fall, Romanian exports toward Hungary and Bulgaria may decline, tightening supply further south even as headline “European prices” appear weak. This divergence underscores a core reality for SEE: continental oversupply does not guarantee regional abundance.
Bulgaria and Greece, further downstream, feel French oversupply mostly indirectly. Lower prices in Central Europe can redirect flows that would otherwise move south-east, especially when congestion on north–south corridors intensifies. In such scenarios, Bulgaria may experience reduced import availability despite apparent EU-wide surplus, while Greece remains largely insulated due to its distance and internal renewable dynamics.
For Montenegro, Albania, and Bosnia and Herzegovina, the impact is more subtle but tangible. When Central European prices fall, regional traders reallocate hydro exports toward higher-priced southern markets or balancing windows rather than base exports northward. This affects revenue timing and increases reliance on intraday optimisation rather than volume-based exports. French oversupply therefore acts less as a blanket price suppressant and more as a flow-shaping force, redistributing volatility across hours and borders. In SEE, the key consequence is a growing mismatch between headline European fundamentals and local price realities—a gap that only sophisticated cross-border analysis can bridge.
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