No Asian gas hub imminent: Osaka Gas
Lack of fully liberalised East Asian downstream sectors and growing linkage to European prices slow progress towards a stand-alone regional gas market
The development of a fully liquid traded gas hub in East Asia remains unlikely in the near future, an analyst at Japanese utility Osaka Gas told the European Annual Gas Conference in Paris on Tuesday. Physical spot LNG trading and paper trade in futures contracts settling against the JKM index provided by price reporting agency S&P Global Platts continues to grow. But factors particular to East Asian countries’ gas markets, as well as an increasing benchmark role for the European TTF reference price in Asia, continue to hamper the development of a truly Asian gas-on-gas competitive traded market. While it would be beneficial to have a pipeline gas and LNG hub in Asia, “to create a tran
Also in this section
4 March 2026
The US president has repeatedly promised to lower gasoline prices, but this ambition conflicts with his parallel aim to increase drilling and could be upended by his war against Iran
4 March 2026
With the Strait of Hormuz effectively closed following US-Israel strikes and Iran’s retaliatory escalation, Fujairah has become the region’s critical pressure release valve—and is now under serious threat
3 March 2026
The killing of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei in US–Israeli strikes marks the most serious escalation in the region in decades and a bigger potential threat to the oil market than the start of the Russia-Ukraine crisis
2 March 2026
A potential blockade of the Strait of Hormuz following the escalating US-Iran conflict risks disrupting Qatari LNG exports that underpin global gas markets, exposing Asia and other markets to sharp price spikes, cargo shortages and renewed reliance on dirtier fuels
