Speculation or Fundamentals? European Natural Gas Price Swings Post 2020

The study by Emanuele Citera and Veronika Dolar explores the dynamics of the European natural gas market during one of its most turbulent periods, 2020–24. Amid extreme price volatility triggered by the energy crisis following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, our analysis attempts to disentangle the impact for speculation from fundamental forces across four distinct phases of the crisis.

The findings reveal that speculation contributed only modestly to price movements, while market fundamentals—especially supply disruptions and policy-driven storage dynamics—remained the dominant drivers throughout. Even during periods of heightened volatility, what might appear as speculative pressure often reflected genuine scarcity or regulatory-driven inventory behavior rather than pure speculation.

Emanuele Citera is an Assistant Professor of Economics at Bard College. He received a Ph.D. and M.Phil. in Economics from the New School for Social Research, a M.A. in Economics and Complexity from Collegio Carlo Alberto, and a M.Sc. and B.Sc. in Business Economics from the University of Bologna.

His primary field of research is Financial Economics, with a focus on the stochastic structure of equity markets and speculation in natural gas markets. Other areas of interest include Monetary Economics, Complexity Economics, and the History of Economics.

He recently co-edited the book Central Banking, Monetary Policy, and the European Central Bank, published by Edward Elgar. His work has been published in various academic journals, including Annals of Operations Research, Structural Change and Economic Dynamics, the Review of Political Economy, and the Annals of the Fondazione Luigi Einaudi.