The 2 July SEE power market shows a sharp correction from the previous session’s heat-driven price spike, but not a full normalization. Day-ahead prices fell across every regional market, with HUPX dropping by €98.2/MWh to €136.93/MWh, SEEPEX by €89.5/MWh to €137.41/MWh, OPCOM Romania to €147.86/MWh, and IBEX Bulgaria / HENEX Greece to €145.51/MWh. The cheapest regional market was Slovenia at €118.55/MWh, while Montenegro was the regional maximum at €153.84/MWh. Germany was far lower at €73.31/MWh, leaving the HU-DE spread at €63.62/MWh, which confirms that SEE-Hungary remained structurally detached from Core European pricing despite the day-on-day price collapse.
The main driver was lower demand after the heatwave peak. Regional consumption fell to 33,865 MW average, down 1,252 MW day on day, while net imports increased to 3,779 MW, up 562 MW. Core inflows through the Austria/Slovakia-Hungary/Slovenia corridor rose sharply to 4,166 MW, up 1,069 MW, showing that the price decline was supported by stronger imports rather than by a broad domestic generation recovery. The market also had more solar support, with solar forecast at 7,514 MW, up 967 MW, while wind weakened to 1,351 MW, down 259 MW. That combination explains the softer daytime price profile but also why evening prices remained firm.
The hourly structure is more important than the baseload correction. HUPX recorded a daily minimum of €71/MWh at H14 and a maximum of €250/MWh at H20, while SEEPEX had a minimum of €80/MWh at H12 and a maximum of €281/MWh at H20. Germany and Austria were much softer in the solar window, with Germany falling to -€3/MWh at H14 and Austria to -€4.9/MWh at H14. This created the familiar summer shape: midday prices compressed by solar, followed by a sharp evening residual-demand ramp. The fact that HUPX peak averaged only €124.6/MWh, below its €149.3/MWh off-peak, shows how solar is now reshaping the day block and making baseload less informative for traders, storage operators and industrial offtakers.
The country balance split the region into clear deficit and surplus zones. Bulgaria remained the main exporter at 920 MW, while Bosnia and Herzegovina exported 519 MW. Greece was almost balanced at only 59 MW net export, a major change from the previous day’s 1,047 MW export position. On the deficit side, Romania imported 1,980 MW, Hungary 1,709 MW, Serbia 619 MW, Croatia 387 MW, Montenegro 296 MW, Slovenia 197 MW, and North Macedonia 63 MW. The strongest stress signal is Romania, where lower domestic generation and high regional demand turned the country into the largest import sink.
Serbia’s market was tightly coupled with Hungary. SEEPEX at €137.41/MWh was only €0.48/MWh above HUPX, while Serbian consumption fell to 3,643 MW and generation stood at 3,025 MW, leaving a 619 MW net import position. Serbia’s lower demand helped reduce its import dependence from the previous day, but it remained structurally short. This means the Serbian price signal was not driven by an isolated domestic scarcity event; it was part of a wider HUPX-linked regional balance, with Serbia importing from neighbouring systems while still participating in cross-border flows toward Romania and Hungary.
Montenegro was the clearest scarcity premium in the daily data. BELEN settled at €153.84/MWh, the highest price in the region and €16.91/MWh above HUPX. Domestic consumption was modest at 434 MW, but generation fell to only 138 MW, leaving a 296 MW net import requirement. That explains why Montenegro priced above Serbia, Hungary, Greece and Bulgaria: the issue was not load size, but local generation availability and import dependency. For Montenegro, the day confirms the sensitivity of summer pricing to hydro output, thermal availability and cross-border capacity.
The forward curve did not fully surrender the regional risk premium. Hungarian Week 28 power fell to €107.50/MWh, down €8.5/MWh, and Week 29 to €141/MWh, down €6.5/MWh, but the HU-DE forward spread remained meaningful at €16/MWh for Week 28 and €32/MWh for Week 29. Gas and carbon were slightly softer, with CEGH at €44.65/MWh, Greek gas at €45/MWh, and EUA at €79.54/t, but these moves were not large enough to explain the full spot correction. The day was mainly a weather, residual-load and import-flow reset, not a fundamental collapse in the summer risk premium.
The trading signal is therefore mixed rather than bearish. The heatwave premium has clearly unwound from the extreme 1 July levels, but SEE-Hungary still trades well above Germany and Austria, and the evening ramp remains expensive. The key watch points for the next sessions are H20 scarcity pricing, AT/SK-to-HU/SI core inflows, Romania’s import depth, Montenegro’s generation deficit, and whether Serbia continues to price almost flat to HUPX. A renewed temperature rise or weaker solar output would quickly restore upside risk, especially in Hungary, Romania, Serbia, Montenegro and the Greece-Bulgaria block.
