Three prohibitions, one regime
From 1 January 2027, three behaviours are prohibited in the electricity, natural gas, emissions trading and organised YEK-G markets: failing to disclose inside information on time, trading on inside information and manipulating the market. The regulation defines all three together as “market-distorting behaviour” and attaches an administrative fine to each.
On 15 October 2026 the EPDK Board adopted two implementing texts: the minimum list of information to be disclosed on the Inside Information Platform (decision 14967) and a 75-page Guide to Market-Distorting Behaviour (decision 14969). The list was published in the Official Gazette on 20 October, and the guide on EPDK’s website the same day. The guide draws heavily on ACER’s guidance on REMIT, the EU regime in force since 2011; its list of manipulative practices follows ACER’s in the same order.
From the law to the guide
The legal basis is Climate Law no. 7552, in force since July 2025. It added to Article 16 of Electricity Market Law no. 6446 an administrative fine and the power to take interim measures for market-distorting behaviour in all markets and bilateral contracts, including the ETS: up to 2 million TL for natural persons and 20 million TL for legal persons, and no less than twice any gain or harm. It left the types of behaviour and the procedure to a regulation to be issued after consulting the Capital Markets Board.
The regulation was published on 14 February 2026 and was originally due to take effect on 1 June 2026. An amendment on 23 May 2026 moved the date to 1 January 2027 for the whole text. The October decisions and the guide prepare for the new date.
The scope is broad. The futures electricity market (VEP), day-ahead and intraday markets, balancing power market, ancillary services, natural gas spot and futures markets, the emissions trading system, the organised YEK-G market and wholesale bilateral contracts in these markets are covered, whether the contract is arranged through a broker or directly. Cash-settled derivatives on Borsa İstanbul and contracts with end consumers are out of scope.
The obligations do not apply equally. Only market participants must disclose inside information. The bans on insider trading and manipulation bind every natural and legal person, participant or not; in practice the forms of manipulation that require orders and trades are committed by participants, through the natural persons who decide on behalf of a legal entity.
Effect is enough
The manipulation ban does not require intent; actual or likely effect on the market is enough. Intent is required only for attempts, where no effect arises. A gain is not required either. The guide states that even an erroneous order on the intraday market may count as manipulation depending on the facts.
The guide also lists the signs of a “non-genuine” order or trade: uneconomic price levels, prices out of line with the market because of an erroneous trade, a purpose other than buying or selling (for example setting a closing price), orders placed with no intention of execution, and volumes well above or below the portfolio’s needs.
The defence depends on the type. For an order that moves the price to an artificial level, the defence is a legitimate reason or an accepted market practice. Where market rules are abused, formal compliance with them is no defence on its own. The guide also stresses that an artificial price is not to be confused with an abnormal one: a price at the cap or floor that reflects market conditions is not artificial in itself.
Five types of manipulation
Article 9 of the regulation defines manipulation in five types. The first four require placing orders or trading and are treated as in-market behaviour; the fifth rests on disseminating information and is treated as off-market. The table gives the guide’s headings in Turkish with a translation.
The guide’s 25 practices
Alongside the types, the guide lists 25 “practices”. The list is independent of the types; according to the guide each practice may fall under one or more of them. It follows the list in ACER’s REMIT guidance in the same order.
The guide uses no English terms; the ACER terms are those in ACER’s REMIT guidance (6.1 edition, paras 315–316). ACER’s “creating a misperception through specific actions” does not appear in the guide. The guide also gives a 13-item list of possible signs of manipulation.
Order book games
The first half of the list concerns behaviour in the order book and matters most for continuously traded markets: the intraday market, VEP and the natural gas continuous trading platform (STP). What these practices share is that the supply or demand visible in the book is not real. In wash trades and pre-arranged trading, prices and volumes form without ownership or risk actually changing hands. In layering and spoofing, the non-genuine orders sit on one side of the book and the real position on the other.
The guide’s electricity example (Example 35) shows how this works. Close to delivery, a participant enters many layered, high-volume sell orders on the intraday market and cancels most of them shortly before they would match, while making small purchases at lower prices on the other side. The selling pressure visible in the book pushes others to lower their prices; the participant buys the cheaper energy, and its sell orders disappear without matching.
In the guide’s natural gas example (Example 36), one-sided layered orders are entered in an illiquid daily contract and cancelled quickly, creating an artificial impression of depth. The guide is explicit that orders not matching does not remove the risk. The Authority may also request and review the design of algorithmic trading systems.
Capacity withholding and hoarding
For generators the most critical heading is capacity withholding. The guide defines it as a participant able to influence price, supply or demand on its own not offering generation, storage or transmission capacity without a legitimate reason. It takes two forms: not offering capacity at all when there is no outage (physical) and offering it at an excessive price inconsistent with the plant’s marginal cost (economic). A breach requires both an effect on price or on the supply-demand balance and the absence of a legitimate reason. In the guide’s example (Example 37), an available plant does not offer part of its capacity without any outage, maintenance, fuel problem or technical constraint; the same result can come from high-priced offers that cannot match.
An illustrative calculation shows the mechanism. In a tight evening hour, an available 400 MW plant withholds 100 MW and the PTF rises from 3,200 to 3,700 TL/MWh. Assume a marginal cost of 2,500 TL/MWh. On the 300 MW it sells, the plant earns 300 × 500 = 150,000 TL more per hour; the margin lost on the 100 MW withheld is 100 × (3,700 − 2,500) = 120,000 TL. The net effect is +30,000 TL. This is why the guide’s condition of being able to move the price on one’s own matters: for a small plant that cannot move the price, the same behaviour does not pay.
Capacity hoarding concerns cross-border transmission capacity: reserving interconnection capacity, blocking other participants’ access and not using it, or not using it effectively. The guide gives no example. As an illustration, a company allocated import capacity with a neighbouring country that leaves it unused even in hours when the price spread favours imports reduces cheap supply into Türkiye and keeps the PTF high.
Cross-product and cross-contract
The guide defines these two practices separately. Cross-product manipulation is placing orders or trading in a related product to move a product’s price to an artificial level. The guide points to two links: a misleading signal on the intraday market can affect other participants’ decisions for the next day’s day-ahead trades, and a suspicious intraday trade can also have an effect in the balancing power market. Çapraz işlem manipulation is moving an organised-market price to an artificial level to benefit from obligations under bilateral contracts.
An illustration of the cross-product effect: a generator that will sell 400 MWh an hour in tomorrow’s day-ahead market buys 30 MWh it does not need in thinly traded evening intraday hours today, 300 TL/MWh above the market, to create an impression of tight supply. The premium over the market price costs 30 × 300 = 9,000 TL, plus the imbalance cost of the surplus energy. If the impression leads others to raise their offers for the same hours tomorrow and the PTF rises by 100 TL/MWh, the generator’s day-ahead sales bring in 400 × 100 = 40,000 TL more per hour.
The logic of çapraz işlem manipulation comes from many bilateral contracts being linked to the PTF or the intraday average. In the day-ahead market the PTF is the single price where the supply and demand curves cross; a few tens of MWh of orders near that point that serve no real need can shift the PTF, and that changes the value of hundreds of MWh of contracts linked to it. The participant loses a little in the day-ahead market and gains several times that on the bilateral contract.
For contracts linked to the intraday weighted average price, the same risk is sharper in thinly traded hours. In an hour where 500 MWh trades at an average of 3,000 TL/MWh, a participant that matches 100 MWh at 3,600 with its own group company lifts the average to 3,100; the money stays within the group, so these trades cost nothing. Çapraz işlem manipulation and pre-arranged trading then occur together. The guide’s gas example (Example 40) shows the same structure: a company related to a participant with a purchase contract priced off the daily reference price places high-volume matching orders well below the prevailing market in the window used to calculate the reference; the guide treats this example under manipulation by deception or contrivance.
A participant with an indexed position should be able to explain its orders in the market that sets the index by its real needs and costs.
The calculations in this section are illustrative examples we prepared to explain the definitions; apart from Example 40 they are not in the guide and are not EPDK’s interpretation. A purchase that covers a real need is legitimate even if it raises the PTF; the problem is an order inconsistent with needs and costs that moves the price to an artificial level.
Reference prices and deception
Reference price manipulation is moving, lowering or fixing the price in the critical windows when reference, opening or closing prices are set. In the guide’s gas example (Example 38), a participant trading, without any physical or commercial need, out of line with the general price level in the window when the reference price is set may benefit from the change through its reference-linked positions.
Manipulation by deception or contrivance involves not a single order but a scheme of in-market and off-market steps. In the guide’s electricity example (Example 39), a participant sells day-ahead for the next day, notifies an unplanned outage for hours of tight supply and, when buyers turn to the intraday market and prices rise, sells there before the outage is fixed; it then announces that the outage was “fixed unexpectedly fast” and buys back on the cheaper intraday market. The guide treats the use of operational notices that do not reflect real intentions as devices, and so as manipulation.
Abuse of rules and dissemination
Abuse of the market or its rules is a type specific to the Turkish regime, with no separate equivalent in REMIT. It covers finding gaps in market design, flexibility in the rules or asymmetries in systems and using them to the detriment of the market or other participants, and it requires no calculable financial loss. The guide’s example (Example 41) is from the gas market: on supply-constrained days the balancing surplus (BAST) is distributed by trading volume, and two participants agree on high-volume matched trades that change no ownership and leave each with a net zero position, inflating their shares.
Dissemination is the only off-market type and binds everyone. Rumours, false news, deliberate concealment of material facts and knowingly incorrect reporting are covered; the person spreading the information must know or ought to know that it is false. In the guide’s example (Example 42), an energy data platform publishes “breaking” news of a transformer accident at a critical plant with no notice from the owner, and intraday prices rise artificially. REMIT’s special rule for journalism has no equivalent in the regulation.
Trash and cash and pump and dump combine a position with information. As an illustration, a trader that sells the December baseload VEP contract, then places aggressive sell orders and spreads unfounded comments such as “demand will stay weak this winter” to push the price down and closes the position cheaply falls under the definition. Disclosing one’s own trade and misleading research follow the same logic: trading against a disclosed position or a published report right after it.
Inside information and the one-hour rule
From 1 January 2027, a change in a power plant’s capacity caused by an outage or maintenance stops being internal company information. Changes of 30 MW or more per facility or 50 MW or more per portfolio must be made public on EPİAŞ’s Inside Information Platform within one hour of the event arising. For planned maintenance the clock starts when the plan becomes firm, for example when the system operator approves it. Other information, such as commissioning new plants, is disclosed as soon as possible.
The guide requires four elements together for information to count as inside information: it relates directly or indirectly to traded products, it has not been made public, it would be likely to move prices significantly if disclosed, and it has occurred or may reasonably be expected to occur. The test is whether a “reasonable” market participant would be likely to use it as part of a trading decision.
Decision 14967 simplifies this test. For items with a threshold, events above it are disclosed in every case, without being left to the participant’s assessment, provided they have not been made public and have occurred or are likely to occur. Events below the threshold are not automatically excluded: the guide gives the example of a 25 MW maintenance extension that may need disclosure in hours of tight supply.
The list also covers natural gas (6 items), the emissions trading system (2 items), the YEK-G annual unavailability plan and intermediate steps of protracted processes, 19 items in all. Source: EPDK Board Decision 14967.
A disclosure uses the platform’s structured fields (facility, MW affected, start and expected end) and a mandatory free-text field stating the cause. If the start or end time, the MW value or the cause changes, the update follows within the same deadline and every version stays accessible. A disclosure of an event that will not happen is cancelled within the same deadline; the cancellation stays visible and does not remove responsibility for trades based on the earlier disclosure. A company website or social media account counts only as additional communication.
For plants in an aggregator’s portfolio the aggregator discloses, and the plant owner must pass the information to the aggregator immediately. If the owner passed it on but the aggregator did not disclose properly, the aggregator is responsible; if the owner did not pass it on, the breach is the owner’s. Disclosure may exceptionally be delayed to protect a legitimate interest if this does not mislead the public, confidentiality can be maintained and no one trades on the information; this is not an approval process, and the decision and its reasons are reported to EPİAŞ without delay. Listed companies keep their separate public disclosure duty under capital markets rules.
Disclose first, then trade
Insider trading is defined in three forms: trading on the information, disclosing it to others outside the normal course of work or duties, and recommending or inducing others to trade on it. No gain is required; intent and negligence are not distinguished; deciding not to cancel a trade after learning the information is also covered. A participant that discloses on time but trades in the minutes before disclosure still breaches the ban. A participant that learns inside information belonging to someone else does not disclose it, but must observe the bans on trading, disclosure and recommendation until it is public.
A generator aware of an unplanned outage may not cover its short position intraday before disclosing.
This is the guide’s most debatable example: a generator aware of an unplanned outage that buys on the intraday market before disclosure to hedge against a likely price rise commits insider trading. REMIT in the EU grants a narrow exemption for trades that cover the immediate physical loss from an unplanned outage; it applies only within the day and only where an existing contract would otherwise be breached, and according to ACER becoming imbalanced is not enough. The Turkish regulation has no equivalent of this or REMIT’s other exemptions. In practice the sequence is: disclose on the platform first, then trade.
The ban is not limited to the participant’s own account. Trading for a third party’s account (buying for the parent company, or trading for a client under a portfolio management agreement) and indirect use are covered too; indirect use includes a subsidiary trading for its own account on the parent’s instruction and trading on information shared within the group. The guide separately defines trading for one’s own account ahead of a client’s pending order (front running or pre-positioning) and stepping in between with a mark-up where one trade would suffice (double printing).
Differences from REMIT
The guide is very close to ACER’s guidance in its definitions of inside information and manipulation. The differences lie in infrastructure, thresholds and exemptions. The Turkish regime has none of REMIT’s exemptions for insider trading and no journalism rule; on the other hand it has a manipulation type that REMIT lacks (abuse of market rules). The definition of inside information does not require REMIT’s “precise nature” element, and suspicious transaction reporting falls on all participants.
REMIT sets no MW threshold in the EU; disclosure depends on whether the information is inside information, and ACER treats maintenance at a 50 MW unit as within that scope. The 100 MW figure is the threshold for ENTSO-E transparency data. Türkiye’s 30 and 50 MW thresholds make disclosure automatic above that size, with no assessment needed. Compared with the 2022–2026 rule, however, the threshold rises: the obligation to publish every outage at plants of 10 MW installed capacity and above on the Transparency Platform ends, and changes between 10 and 30 MW will be disclosed only if they pass the inside information test. Neither the decision nor the guide defines how the portfolio threshold is aggregated.
Fines, reporting and compliance
At 2026 values, the caps are 2,509,800 TL for a breach of the disclosure obligation; 25,098,000 TL for a market participant engaged in insider trading or manipulation; and 2,509,800 TL for a natural person who commits the act, including those who take part in the decision on behalf of a legal entity. Where a gain was made or harm caused, the fine may not be less than twice that amount, and this floor applies even above the cap; attempts are fined up to half the cap. There is no fine on natural persons for a disclosure breach.
The amounts are updated each year with the revaluation rate under Law no. 5326. Because the regime starts in 2027, the first caps to apply will be the 2027 figures, raised by the rate to be announced in November 2026. In setting a fine, EPDK considers the gravity and duration of the breach, fault, market impact, repetition, the previous year’s net sales in the relevant market and cooperation; decisions are published on EPDK’s website.
Interim measures come alongside fines. In case of a breach or strong suspicion the Board, or in emergencies the market operator, can demand additional collateral, block receivables, suspend or cancel orders and trades and impose a temporary trading ban; a measure taken by the operator goes to the Board for approval immediately. Participants must report any information or suspicion of market-distorting behaviour without delay to EPDK and the relevant market operator: EPİAŞ for intraday, TEİAŞ for balancing, both where a trade affects both. Reports are made in writing or through the operator’s portal, and the reporter’s identity is kept confidential.
Most of the compliance steps in the table are the guide’s recommendations; what is binding is the regulation’s duty to take the measures needed to prevent market-distorting behaviour and the reporting duty.
For investors
The regime does not change a plant’s value directly; it changes how that value is protected. In a market where outage information reaches prices within minutes, the timing advantage large portfolios draw from their own information narrows. In return, a late notice, a hedge in the wrong order or an order beside an indexed contract that serves no real need now carries a direct risk of fines and trading bans.
Storage investors face an open question. The guide defines economic withholding against the plant’s marginal cost and does not mention opportunity cost. The ACER guidance it draws on explicitly includes opportunity cost in marginal cost and treats the expected value of selling at another time as a legitimate reason for energy-limited assets such as reservoir hydro. On that approach, a battery holding energy for the evening peak and bidding high at midday is legitimate; capacity withholding is also defined only for participants able to influence the price on their own. Even so, documenting the reasoning will be part of compliance from 2027.
At Frekans we are building outage reporting for the plants in our aggregation portfolio and the batteries we manage as a single process, from the alarm on site to the disclosure on the platform. Before 1 January 2027 we are putting into written procedures the information flow between operations and trading, the record of bid rationales and the joint monitoring of indexed contracts and organised-market orders.
