Analysis of Japan's LNG Import Spot Price: what are the implications to domestic gas pricing in Indonesia?

Gas export to Japan has become an important source of revenue for Indonesia since the 1970s. Traditionally, the gas was priced with linkage to the oil price. However, changes in the market during the early 2010s has put pressure to this traditional pricing mechanism. Using the Vector Auto-regression (VAR) approach, this research aims to understand whether the spot LNG import pricing in Japan is moving away from JCC linkage or not, and the extent of the change if there is any. <br>LNG price analyzed in this research is the Japanese spot cargo import price, published by the Japanese Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry from March 2014 to November 2017. The Japanese LNG spot price was regressed against US Henry Hub (HH) and UK NBP gas hub prices, Japan Customs-Cleared (JCC) crude oil price, and Japan imported coal price in the same period.<br>The historical decomposition of the VAR model suggests that the spot LNG price in Japan were increasingly affected by US Henry Hub and UK NBP gas prices, while the effect of JCC crude oil price is weaker, and Japanese imported coal having no significant effect towards Japanese spot LNG price. The impact of mature gas hub prices is also dynamic: HH is showing stronger effect in the mid 2016, then it changed to the domination of NBP in mid 2017.<br>The result further indicates the increasing connectivity of gas price around the world, with US and UK price affecting Japanese gas price through spot LNG trade. Due to the demand condition in Japan and East Asian market in general, the continuation of US/European gas hub price effect is likely to happen until early 2020s, as the slight deficit in this region might be fulfilled by spot LNG import. Under the new domestic gas pricing regulation in Indonesia, the continuation of NBP impact towards gas pricing in Japan might reduce the price to the level at which fulfilling the increasing domestic gas demand is more efficient than exporting LNG.

自20世纪70年代起，对日本的天然气出口便成为印度尼西亚的重要收入来源。传统上，此类天然气的定价与油价挂钩。然而2010年代初期的市场变革，给这一传统定价机制带来了挑战。本研究采用向量自回归（Vector Auto-regression, VAR）方法，旨在探究日本液化天然气（Liquefied Natural Gas, LNG）现货进口定价是否正脱离日本海关清关（Japan Customs-Cleared, JCC）原油挂钩模式，以及若存在偏离，其具体偏离程度如何。
本研究分析的LNG价格，为2014年3月至2017年11月期间由日本经济产业省发布的日本现货船货进口价格。研究以同期美国亨利中心（Henry Hub, HH）、英国国家平衡点（National Balancing Point, NBP）天然气枢纽价格、日本海关清关原油价格以及日本进口煤炭价格作为自变量，对日本LNG现货价格开展回归分析。
VAR模型的历史分解结果显示，日本LNG现货价格受美国亨利中心与英国国家平衡点天然气价格的影响日益增强，而日本海关清关原油价格的影响则相对减弱，日本进口煤炭价格对日本LNG现货价格无显著影响。成熟天然气枢纽价格的影响亦呈现动态特征：2016年中期，亨利中心价格的影响更为显著，随后在2017年中期，英国国家平衡点价格的影响占据主导地位。
研究结果进一步表明，全球天然气价格的联动性日益增强，美英两国的天然气价格通过LNG现货贸易对日本天然气价格产生影响。鉴于日本及整体东亚市场的需求格局，美欧天然气枢纽价格的影响或将持续至21世纪20年代初期——该地区的小幅供需缺口可通过LNG现货进口得以填补。根据印度尼西亚新出台的国内天然气定价新规，若英国国家平衡点价格对日本天然气定价的影响持续存在，则可能将价格拉低至某一水平，使得满足国内日益增长的天然气需求比出口LNG更具经济效率。