Even more energy suppliers are short of capital. Ofgem needs to toughen up

2026-01-28 - 19:30

With almost one-in-five firms breaching targets the watchdog’s new get-tough approach on capital levels seems to be anything but When half the nation’s retail energy suppliers, including Bulb with 1.7 million customers, failed during the gas crisis of 2021-22, the embarrassed regulator, Ofgem, decided it should probably pay more attention to companies’ balance sheets. Better late than never. The cost of mopping up the corporate calamities added up to £2.7bn, or £94 on every household’s energy bill, calculated the National Audit Office. The result was a new regime from March last year in which Ofgem set “capital targets” for each supplier to ensure financial resilience. And the secondary effect was an entertaining quarrel between Octopus Energy, which confessed to being one of three suppliers below its capital target, and British Gas-owning Centrica, whose chief executive argued it was “criminal” that the regulator was not applying its ultimate sanction of barring under-target firms from taking on new customers. Continue reading...