The next Goulburn-to-Murray trade opening is scheduled for Friday 16 October 2026. Based on current estimates, approximately 5 gigalitres (GL) of Goulburn-to-Murray trade opportunity will be released.

The estimated 5 GL of trade opportunity is an indicative volume based on the available data to date.

The actual volume available for trade will be calculated and announced on 15 October 2026, with the trade opportunity becoming available on the following day, 16 October 2026.

• Applications for the Goulburn-to-Murray trade opportunity should be submitted during the submission window, between 7 am and 2 pm on Friday 16 October 2026, through My Water or the Broker Portal. All trade applications during this period will be queued for later processing.

• After the submission window closes, DEECA will undertake a randomisation process to determine a processing order of the applications, in the presence of an Australian Competition and Consumer Commission independent observer.

• Processing of applications, in the order determined by the randomisation process, will occur as soon as possible after randomisation.

• The My Water and Broker Portal will be briefly offline on Friday 16 October 2026 once manual processing is complete (approximately half an hour). Normal Register operations will then resume. The timing of this outage, once known, will be announced on the Victorian Water Register news.
  
  

Application eligibility criteria

Applications received during the trade opening will be managed in accordance with the published Trade Application Procedure. Please note:

• For any one seller ABA, the total volume submitted (whether singly or via multiple trade applications) for consideration into the randomisation process cannot exceed the volume of tradable allocation available in that ABA at the start of the submission window (7 am, 16 October 2026).
  
  
• Applications to ‘trade remaining balance’ will be deemed ineligible for the randomisation pool.

Improving access to trade

• In response to feedback received from customers and industry representatives, including through consultation undertaken as part of the Improving Access to Trade Project, from October 2026, the application submission window for each Goulburn-to-Murray trade opening will occur on the first business day following the 1 July, 15 October and 15 December seasonal determination announcements.
  
  
• This updated approach ensures that any allocation increase announced through a seasonal determination will be available for trade when the application submission window opens. It affects the timing of the trade opening only and does not affect how the available trade volume is determined.

Further Information

The volume available for trade is determined in accordance with the Trading Rules for Declared Water Systems.

Further information about the application, randomisation and processing arrangements for the Goulburn-to-Murray trade opening are available on the Trade Opening Processes page.

DEECA has also produced frequently asked questions about how the Goulburn-to-Murray trade rules work, and some worked examples.

For further information or assistance, reach out to the Victorian Water Register team on waterregister.support@deeca.vic.gov.au.