Globes: Sheshinski: Breaking up gas monopoly won't solve anything
The solution to the problem of natural gas prices in Israel is not the break up of Delek Group Ltd. (TASE: DLEKG) and Noble Energy's monopoly; it is establishing a mechanism for linking the price to an accepted international price, according to Prof. Eytan Sheshinski. Sheshinski headed the committee that altered the state's tax revenue from the natural gas reservoirs. In a "Globes" interview, Sheshinski warned that creating a duopoly in place of the current monopoly could even worsen the consumer's plight, and admitted that there was no perfect solution for the structure of the gas industry.
Sheshinski was very careful not to be perceived as someone spoiling the "euphoria surrounding the splitting of control over the reservoirs," as he described the enthusiastic public response to Antitrust Authority director general Prof. David Gilo's decision to retract the agreement he had signed. "I support Gilo's action in the sense that his motives were reasonable. From the outset, there was no chance of generating pressure on prices by selling the two small reservoirs (Tanin and Karish, A.B.), and I can therefore understand his withdrawal from the agreement. He did not propose follow-up measures."