Annual Report 2010 - Enel.com

inventories at their highest level in the last five years.
Coal prices rose rapidly over the course of 2010, once
again under the impulse of Chinese demand, which in
just a few years has transformed that country from a net
exporter of coal into the world’s largest importer of that
commodity. Towards the end of the year, coal prices were
also affected by the flooding in Australia and Indonesia,
which drove the price of South African coal to $130 a metric
ton in December.
In 2010 the average CIF Northern Europe (API2) price
Money market
3.5
3
2.5
2
1.5
1
0.5
0
Feb
09
Apr
09
Jun
09
Aug
09
Oct
09
Dec
09
of coal was $91.7 a metric ton, up 30% on 2009.
The spot price of natural gas at the Zeebrugge rose from
31.3 GBpence/therm in 2009 to 43.3 GBpence/therm
in 2010, an increase of 38%. The price was considerably
impacted by weather conditions, especially the very cold
weather registered in Northern Europe at the end of the
year, which triggered a sharp rise in spot prices.
Finally, the average price of low-sulfur fuel oil rose by
27.4%, from $371 a metric ton in 2009 to $473 a metric
ton in 2010.
6-MONTH EURIBOR EURO/DOLLAR
Developments in the money markets in 2009 and 2010
were primarily attributable to the financial market crisis.
The euro/dollar exchange rate went from an average
of 1.39 in 2009 to 1.33 in 2010, a depreciation of 4.5%.
Feb
10
Apr
10
Jun
10
6-month Euribor (%) Euro/dollar exchange rate
Aug
10
Oct
10
Dec
10
6-month Euribor fell from an average of 1.43% in 2009 to
1.26% in 2010, with a slight rise at the end of 2010 after a
significant declining trend over the last two years.
Economic developments in the countries in
which Enel operates
In 2010 the recovery in the world economy strengthened,
with activity rising from the trough of the crisis reached
around mid-2009. Industrial output began to rise again in
both the euro area and the United States, although it has
not yet returned to pre-crisis levels. Part of the decline in
production, however, has been structural, with the closure
of plants in the worst phase of the recession in 2009.
Developments in economic indicators in the 1st Half of
2010 pointed to robust growth in the world economy,
continuing throughout the spring, followed by a gradual
deceleration from the summer onwards. Market growth
slowed in the middle months of the year, partly in response
to the fears about the sustainability of the sovereign
debt of a number of European economies (Greece,
Ireland, Portugal and Spain).
World GDP expanded by 4.1% in 2010, compared with a
contraction of 1.9% in 2009. Driving the recovery last year
was the rise in demand in the Asian emerging economies,
1.6
1.5
1.4
1.3
1.2
1.1
35