Yes, it’s being laundered back to Europe at 10X the cost.
But the simple fact is that Europe does not have the LNG terminal and storage capacity to meet its needs, even if every LNG tanker on all the oceans was sent to Europe.
Plus, Europe scooping up all available LNG tankers is wrecking the economies of poorer countries, who now cannot afford LNG at all, priced out of the market by Europe.
That’s the plan.
One of the largest LNG terminals in the US, the Freeport terminal in Texas, recently had a huge fire that took it offline. It looks like it could have been a cyber-attack that caused an over-pressure condition that ruptured some distribution pipes. The EPA has been throwing roadblocks to repair work and they keep slipping the estimated date to return to service. It has been causing a great deal of volatility in the natural gas market which has impacted some of my investments.
Really? It's doubtful there are any really significant purchases at much over market price. (If you understand how this market works.) So, work that back to Pooty. Those must be some really hefty discounts.
In addition, lack of transport capacity works both ways. Russia has no way to get roughly half of the gas it exported to Europe to its customers like China, India, etc. As long as prices remain in the stratosphere, and Russia's discounts are not too large, Pooty comes out ok. However, except for a brief spike when Russia announced the cutoff to Europe, Dutch TTF (futures pricing) have been coming down for some time now. I just checked & Dutch TTF generally continues to come down. And Russia has to discount heavily below that? Not a good trend for Pooty.
Mind you, I think the energy sanctions are a mistake. Oversupply (or at least a major wartime footing program well in place to get there) to drive down prices should have been created first.