Statoil CFO: EU gas market well supplied, expects limited U.S. LNG impact

The European gas market is well supplied and Statoil sees only a limited impact from U.S. LNG volumes this year, the Norwegian company’s Chief Financial Officer Hans Jakob Hegge said on Wednesday.

“Looking at the gas market moving forward the starting point is that the EU gas market is well-supplied short-term both with gas from Russia and from Norway and potential some new LNG volumes coming in,” Hegge told analysts on Wednesday after his presentation on the company’s first-quarter results.

“So far this year we see limited U.S. LNG volumes reaching the EU,” Hegge said, adding that the additional LNG supply from Australia is likely to end up in Asia.

Worth mentioning, Portugal has on Tuesday received the first cargo from Cheniere’s Sabine Pass LNG export terminal in Louisiana. This is the first U.S. LNG cargo produced from shale gas to reach Europe.