JERA, the joint venture of Japanese power utilities TEPCO and Chubu Electric created in late 2015 to join force in fuel procurement (LNG, oil and coal), upstream development and gas investments, is in talks with other LNG-importing companies to create an alliance of buyers, which would significantly improve their negotiating power.
JERA is in talks with South Korea's national gas company Kogas (South Korea is the second largest LNG importer behind Japan) and with China National Offshore Oil Corp. (CNOOC) on LNG procurement and investment. These companies account for more than one third of global LNG trade: JERA's purchases (TEPCO and Chubu Electric) is around 40 Mt/year, while Kogas imported 31.4 Mt of LNG in 2015 and CNOOC 14.1 Mt in 2014. An alliance of these companies could import around 85 Mt/year of LNG, which would represent 35% of 2014 LNG imports (239 Mt).
Since February 2014, Asian spot LNG prices have been falling, from US$19.7/MBtu to less than US$5/MBtu in January 2016.