The 6% discount on natural gas price Russian President Vladimir Putin offered this week is not final and Turkey made a counter bid, seeking a deeper discount, Hurriyet Daily News quoted Turkey’s energy minister Taner Yildiz as saying on December 2. Price negotiations are continuing. Yildiz did not provide the details of Ankara’s proposal but Russian energy minister Alexander Novak said this week that Turkey was seeking a 15% discount.  Yildiz expects price negotiations with Moscow to be concluded by the end of the year.

During his one-day official visit to Turkey this week, Putin said Russia would grant a 6% starting January 1, 2015 and would increase gas supplies to Turkey by 3bn cubic meters under the Blue Stream project. Ankara and Moscow also signed a memorandum of understanding on December 1 for the construction of an offshore gas pipeline to Turkey with the annual capacity of 63bn cubic meters. Turkey will receive 14bn cubic meters of that amount and the rest will be delivered to the Turkish-Greek border. Turkey is Russian Gazprom's second largest sales market behind Germany. In 2013, Gazprom supplied Turkey with 26.7bn cubic meters of natural gas.

Gazprom's gas exports to the European Union and Turkey declined by a 25% in November, an industry source told Reuters on December 2. Russian gas exports fell to 10.5bn cubic metres (bcm) in November, down from 14 bcm in the same month last year, the source said. This brings year-to-date Russian gas exports to the two key markets, to 145 bcm from 135 bcm in January-November 2013, Reuters reported.