Spain’s Deputy PM Hits Out at Utility for Witholding Price Data

(Bloomberg) -- Spain's Economy Minister Nadia Calvino, who is also deputy prime minister, criticized an unnamed utility for not disclosing information needed to gauge inflation.

“There is one electricity company that hasn't delivered the data” that has been requested for months by the national statistics agency, Calvino said in an interview with state-owned radio broadcaster RNE Thursday, declining to identify the firm.

The statistics agency is reviewing the way it accounts for energy prices in its inflation estimates, particularly the outsize impact of natural gas on the forecasts. Spain, along with Portugal, is working on a plan to cap gas prices used for power generation to contain the surge in electricity costs and, consequently, inflation.

The government has already been in touch with the Spanish competition authority, which is “studying any behavior that may be blocking a decrease in power prices,” Calvino said.

Read more: Spain Is Working on Details of Plan to Cap Natural Gas Price

A number of utility executives and industry groups have in recent weeks criticized the government's plan to cap gas prices, a move that has been approved by the European Union. The stand-off is the latest in a series of tussles that started last year, when the government unsuccessfully tried to clamp down on the windfall profits utilities made from soaring energy prices.

One of the most vocal critics of the government moves, both last year and with the gas caps this year, has been Ignacio Galan, chairman of Iberdrola SA, the country's largest utility and a global leader in clean-energy generation. Like other critics, Galan argues that setting a cap for gas only in Spain and Portugal will hurt Europe's single power market and set a precedent for other countries to do the same.

Currently, the price of power traded on the Spanish wholesale market is set by the most expensive type of energy of the day, which is currently gas.