The eurozone summit which took place last week will have had procurement chiefs glued to their computer screens as they looked to find out if finance ministers were able to secure a deal to finally contain the debt-crisis.
The answer was yes, albeit a very late yes (a deal was struck late on Thursday) that will see bondholders of Greek debt accept 50% writedowns and the eurozone’s rescue fund capacity boosted to €1tn ($1.4tn).
The news raised confidence and of course prices across the markets and as you would imagine metals, with 'Dr Copper', so called because of the metal's perceived ability to act as a bellweather for the global economy, leading the way.
On the London Metal Exchange, copper ended the week up 13.02% at $7981 per tonne. According to reports on the Financial Times copper prices are rising because of increased demand and lower supplies for the red metal.
Chinese data showed that imports of refined copper rose to an 16 month high in September, while labour problems at some of the world’s largest mines have restricted supply.
Other metals also rose sharply over the week including aluminium (+5.29%), lead (+7.88%), nickel (+5.49%) and zinc (+6.33%). However, precious metals saw some even more impressive gains with gold (+6.79%), silver (+13.14%), platinum (+9.18%) and palladium (+8.17%).
The grain market remained relatively stable over the week with corn up by 0.89%, wheat by 1.96% and soyabeans by 0.40% but as we have come to expect this could quickly change with a gust of wind.
There were also some strong price increases in cocoa (+7.09%), cotton (+7.49%), frozen concentrated orange juice (+5.94%) and natural gas (+8.10%).
Over the last month orange juice has risen by a massive 24.17% and ended last week at $18625 cents per lb. Tropical storms have played their part in seeing prices rise over the past month according to brecorder.com.
Whether this deal finally resolves Europe’s problems remains to be seen but if this steadies the markets then it could prove to be the best news buyers have had all year.
The last thing procurement needs is more of the volatility that has been a feature of commodity markets over 2011.
