Electricity Market Dynamics and Regional Interdependence in the Face of Pandemic Restrictions and the Russian–Ukrainian Conflict

Abstract

Electricity constitutes a significant part of the consumption basket of European households and companies. Since energy products are essential components of almost all products and services, any change in energy prices directly impacts the general price level of those products and services. Therefore, this study aims to conduct a comprehensive analysis of power exchange data between 2019 and 2022. For the analysis, we examined the data of 15 countries. In the research, we compared electricity prices in European power exchanges using the Jaccard similarity index and the overlap coefficient, using the DAM hourly prices between 1 January 2019 and 31 December 2022. We transformed the time series into networks using the visibility graph procedure and compared the networks of the studied countries using the two comparison methods with the degree distribution functions. Our aim is to examine how the market anomalies caused by the COVID-19 pandemic and the Russian–Ukrainian conflict affect European electricity markets and how quickly the repercussions spread across the studied countries’ exchanges, and whether they show persistent or anti-persistent characteristics. The results support that similar market effects significantly influence the pattern of price changes among the countries. The methods forming the basis of the research can provide significant assistance in analyzing market trends and contribute to a better understanding of market processes.