Emaldo Market Review July: The Finnish Ancillary Services Market

Issue 2 | August 2026

Where we are now

In our June review we promised to cover the latest price movements across FFR, FCR, aFRR, and mFRR in Finland and what they mean for the months ahead. The picture that has emerged is consistent with what we reported then, capacity-based ancillary revenues remain under pressure, but the most important development since our last review is the growing evidence that intraday and wholesale trading is stepping up as the market's new engine of revenue. That is a genuinely encouraging shift.

FCR: saturation has taken hold

As we explained in our June review, the sharp fall in Finnish FCR-N prices that began in April 2025 continued through the summer. Battery-driven price cannibalisation in the FCR-N reserve market has been the defining story of the Finnish ancillary services market since then. The pattern mirrors what happened in Sweden's FCR-D market in 2024 and in Denmark's aFRR market more recently: new battery capacity growing faster than the procurement volumes Fingrid needs to fill, with prices adjusting downward as a result.

By 2026, all primary reserve markets in Finland are expected to be saturated. Fingrid's own forecasts anticipate that battery operations will progressively shift from FCR-N towards FCR-D, aFRR, and mFRR procurement over the next few years as the market structure evolves to accommodate the growing fleet of battery assets now connected to the Finnish grid. Nearly 400 megawatts of battery storage was under construction in Finland as of mid-2025, and the pipeline continues to grow.

Intraday: the most important emerging opportunity

The most significant market development to watch in Finland right now is the intraday market. Clean Horizon, in their second half 2025 Finland price forecast, specifically identified intraday as taking a significant share of Finnish battery revenues going forward, directly posing the question of whether intraday is the real hedge against saturation in ancillary services markets. The answer emerging from the data is increasingly yes.

Finland is particularly well positioned to benefit from intraday trading growth. Finland shows one of the highest numbers of hours with negative electricity prices in Europe, with 754 hours in a recent twelve-month period, the second highest in Europe. Negative prices signal surplus renewable generation, precisely the moments when a battery can charge cheaply and discharge later at a profit. As wind and solar continue to grow towards 50% of Finnish electricity production by 2030, the frequency and scale of these arbitrage opportunities will grow with them.

The transition to 15-minute resolution across both the day-ahead and intraday markets, completed in 2025, has meaningfully increased the granularity of trading opportunities available to battery operators. More frequent intervals mean more opportunities to capture price differentials, and sophisticated optimisation platforms are increasingly able to exploit these in ways that were not possible under the previous hourly structure.

aFRR and PICASSO: a market still finding its level

Finland joined PICASSO in March 2025, and the aFRR energy market that launched in June 2024 continues to develop. Fingrid announced in April 2026 a change to imbalance price formation from June 2026, moving to a volume-weighted approach that incorporates both mFRR and aFRR activations. This is a structural market improvement that reflects the growing maturity of Finnish balancing markets and should over time create cleaner price signals for battery operators participating across both products.

The continued rollout of pan-European balancing platforms, PICASSO for aFRR and MARI for mFRR, is creating deeper, more liquid cross-border balancing markets. For battery operators, this means more markets to trade across and more optimisation complexity. Platforms that can simultaneously optimise across FCR, aFRR, mFRR, FFR, day-ahead arbitrage, and intraday trading capture materially more revenue than single-market strategies. Finland's participation in these platforms puts it in an increasingly strong structural position as those markets deepen.

The outlook: why we remain positive

The near-term picture is clear and we have been straightforward about it since our June review: FCR capacity revenues are low and are likely to remain so as battery supply continues to grow. But the medium-term picture is genuinely encouraging, for three reasons.

First, Fingrid expects the need for reserve capacities to grow by 134% over the next five years as wind and solar take a larger share of Finnish electricity generation. More intermittent generation means more need for fast-acting balancing services, precisely what batteries provide. Second, as the intraday market develops and battery optimisers become more sophisticated, the revenue opportunity in energy trading is growing in a way that does not face the same supply-side cap that FCR markets do. Third, Finland's single bidding zone structure simplifies participation and lowers the cost of market operations for battery operators, giving Finnish assets a structural advantage in accessing multiple revenue streams simultaneously.

What this means for your earnings

FCR-based Grid Rewards earnings in Finland remain below the peaks of 2024 and early 2025, and that is likely to continue in the near term. We want to be straightforward about where the market is today while being equally clear about the direction of travel.

The growing role of intraday trading, the structural increase in demand for balancing services that Finland's energy transition will drive, and the deepening of cross-border balancing markets through PICASSO and MARI are all genuine reasons to be optimistic about the trajectory for battery earnings in Finland over the coming years. Emaldo will continue to develop its capabilities across every available market, evolve with the market as new products and opportunities emerge, and work hard to increase what your battery earns on your behalf.

Your battery also continues to save you money on your electricity bills every day regardless of market conditions. In a market where Finland regularly sees some of the highest rates of negative electricity prices in Europe, a battery that stores cheap electricity and uses it at the right time delivers consistent, real savings that do not depend on ancillary service market conditions.

Next month

In our next review we will cover the latest price movements across FCR, aFRR, mFRR, and the intraday market in Finland for July and August, and what the autumn heating season may mean for the market outlook.