UK gas prices recorded week on week losses across the curve. Despite opening the week up on last weeks closing levels (driven by oil related gains on the back of continuing Middle East and North Africa (MENA) factors) the gas market started to soften throughout the week. The sentiment was that the UK energy markets were experiencing some levels of correction with views that gas gains had been “a little over done”. Power prices took their direction for gas. Of particularly note was the fact that gas did appear to de-couple from oil this week. Oil continued to rally with Brent North Sea Crude reaching another ‘high’ of $123.37 bbl on Wednesday. And LNG was also cited as another bearish factor with an influx of LNG cargoes (interesting because a few weeks ago LNG supply concerns helped drive some of the gains seen in the market). Certainly the ongoing MENA turmoil is likely to keep the oil markets nervous because of the potential impact on supply so the bullish oil sentiment is likely to remain. The key question though is whether gas will break away from oil markets (as it did last year). It certainly feels that with Japanese LNG concerns diminishing and with gas potentially decoupling from oil - some market corrections could occur. The inter-relationship with coal could provide some interesting plays too. The carbon floor price introduced in 2013 could cause older coal plant (due to close in 2015 under the LCPD) to come offline 2 years earlier. These same plant may therefore seek to increase their output in the coming year (and the dark spread’s would support this). The result for gas in decreased demand and increase supply which will have an impact on price. However coal stocks are at historical lows. How generators operate in the coming months will provide telling clues.