Why is no mystery:
Category Archives: commodities
Gasoline Prices Today and (Maybe) Tomorrow
Assuming futures contract prices for gasoline are useful predictors for future gasoline prices:
Did Oil Prices Start Rising when Biden Started His War on Fossil Fuels
A reader writes:
I estimate (don’t kinda think) that a large portion of today’s inflation is due to environmental policies, in particular the war on fossil fuels.
IMF World Economic Outlook Forecasts
The entire IMF April WEO is out, with analytical chapters on private debt/global recovery, greener labor markets, and global trade and value chains. The forecasts are revised downward, at global and at national levels, for certain countries:
Inflation and Energy Prices
It’s belaboring the obvious that gasoline (and energy prices) had a big impact on headline inflation [BLS release]. M/m inflation was at Bloomberg consensus of 1.2%, while core was below, at 0.3% vs. consensus 0.5%. However, it’s useful to see how over time exactly how much headline and core diverged.
Farm Income – 2021
Net income up, government support down.
“[I]t’s a big IF that soybeans futures are LONG TERM predictors at all”
That’s a quote from an Econbrowser reader who is almost uniformly wrong on all matters related to economics, but it seems useful to me to provide the empirical evidence on futures as predictors, especially as noted in a recent post rising commodity prices have put upward pressure on inflation rates. Further, with the efficiency of futures markets might have changed over time, with greater financialization.
The Relative Price of Oil – Levels vs. Growth Rates
I hear a lot about “records”. Not so remarkable in levels, but very remarkable in growth rates.
Energy Futures and Future Energy Prices
The IMF blog (Andrea Pescatori, Martin Stuermer, and Nico Valckx) predicts: “Surging Energy Prices May Not Ease Until Next Year”.
Lumber Futures As Predictors
In assessing market views on future lumber prices, reader JohnH writes:
Futures markets aren’t foreseeing a decline in lumber prices any time soon.
https://www.barchart.com/futures/quotes/LS*0/futures-prices