About

The Intra-Day electricity Market
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The Intra-Day electricity Market (IDM) from the Republic of Moldova is a component of the wholesale electricity market on which electricity is traded daily with delivery during the current day and the next day, as close as possible to the time of delivery. IDM is the last commercial market segment, dedicated exclusively to market participants, before the establishment of the operational schedule of the national electric power system and the opening of the balancing market (market in which participation is ensured, on the one hand, by participants qualified for balancing services and, on the other party, by the transmission and system operator as the single buyer of balancing services). Considering that the aim is to connect the Moldavian national market with the European Union market, the IDM works similar to the European intraday market model, ordering participants the opportunity to buy and sell electricity by continuously concluding transactions.
The main advantage of the Intra-Day electricity Market (IDM) is the possibility of trading starting from the day before the delivery day after the Day-Ahead Market has ended, through continuous matching of orders, as soon as the correlation conditions are met and as close as possible to delivery time, up to 90 minutes before delivery. This market segment emerged as a necessity for the efficient management of intermittent production growth in the diversified energy mix, respectively to ensure renewable producers the possibility to balance their portfolio based on an updated forecast as close as possible to the delivery time. At the same time, IDM is an essential tool that allows market participants to take into account unexpected changes in consumption, as well as accidental interruptions.
Thus, improving the balancing of participants through firm hourly electricity transactions with delivery on the current day and the day after the trading day implicitly contributes to reducing the technical and commercial balancing effort of the national electricity system.

Operating in a first stage at national level, but similar to the implemented in the EU area model, IDM responds both to the need for efficient implementation of a short-term energy trading framework, and to the need to accommodate specific elements of the electricity market in the Republic of Moldova, permanently following the goal of Moldavian IDM integration into the single European market.
To respond to supply and demand dynamics, OPEM makes available to participants predefined products (hourly products) and participant-defined products (blocks with participant-defined definition period).
The continuous matching algorithm supports the following types of orders:

  • Simple orders (hourly orders): Sell or buy orders with a specified quantity and price, where buy orders can be executed at the order price or at a lower price, and where sell orders can be executed at the ask price order or at a higher price. Simple orders for the predefined market (orders per hourly interval) can be registered with NON, FOK or IOC execution restrictions. All simple orders can be registered with GFS and GTD validity restrictions;
  • Linked orders: in the case of submission of linked orders, either all orders can be executed in full, or no order will be executed. An orders group may be submitted with this submission restriction if it includes orders that only have the FOK execution restriction;
  • Iceberg Orders: These are simple orders that may be visible with a part of their total quantity in the market, while their full quantity is available for matching in the market. Part of the hidden amount is gradually revealed and will be visible for trading as soon as the part that was visible has been executed.

The continuous matching algorithm supports the following products or a combination thereof as follows:

  • Hourly product: the product supports trading on 24 electricity contracts, one for each hour of the delivery day. The system automatically generates these contracts and makes them available for trading the day at 19:00 before the delivery day;
  • User Defined Blocks: These are combinations of hourly contracts defined by the market participant. The delivery period of user-defined blocks must always cover several consecutive hourly orders, which must be executed together. A user-defined block order cannot be an iceberg order.

The continuous matching algorithm supports the following order execution restrictions:

  • NON (None – no restrictions) – An order submitted with the execution restriction NON is either executed immediately or, if the order cannot be matched immediately, it is recorded in the order register. Partial execution of order is permitted. Orders with the NON restriction can be linked to multiple existing orders and create multiple transactions;
  • Fill or Kill (FOK) – the order is traded in full immediately after the order is submitted, at its full amount, or is deleted without being recorded in the order register. FOK order can be matched with multiple existing orders in the order register. FOK orders cannot have a validity restriction;
  • Immediate or Cancel (IOC – Match immediately as possible and cancel the rest) – the order is either traded (in any percentage) immediately after the order is submitted or, if the order cannot be matched, it is deleted without being recorded in the register of orders. Partial execution is allowed and IOC orders can be executed on multiple orders and create multiple transactions. An order with the IOC execution restriction cannot have a validity restriction;
  • All or None (AON) – An order submitted with the AON execution restriction either matches another order with its full quantity or is recorded in the order register to be matched later under the same conditions. No partial executions of it are allowed. AON execution restriction is only allowed for user-defined orders.

The continuous matching algorithm will support the following order validity restrictions:

  • Good for session (GFS) – the time validity of the order is determined by the validity of the corresponding trading session of the contract. The order is automatically canceled when the time-defined validity of the trading session corresponding to the contract expires;
  • Good till date (GTD) – the time validity of the order is determined by the date and time. The order is automatically canceled when the time-defined validity expires.

The Intra-Day electricity Market is open 24/7, 365 days a year. Trades are concluded at the order price already in the trading system. The matching of orders is carried out if the correlation condition is met, i.e. the price of the buy order is higher or at least equal to the price of the sell order, taking into account the characteristics of the orders and the bidding restrictions.