You may consider drinking your coffee a little more slowly after hearing this.
The price of coffee futures on the commodities market has hit a record-high $4.30 per pound, the coffee-news website Sprudge reported on Thursday. That’s more than a 7 percent increase since the price hit over $4 about a week ago, the first time ever reaching that peak.
The reason for the substantial jump in such a short amount of time is due to panic buying, as Reuters noted earlier this week. “Panic has finally shown up, prices will continue to rise,” said Bob Fish, a co-founder of Biggby Coffee, according to the outlet. “There are only two things that can stop this: one, Brazil and Vietnam have a good yield year (that is not expected until August 2026). Two, there is enough demand destruction in consuming countries because of the price increases.”
Coffee’s soaring price—with Arabica futures hitting record highs for 13 days in a row—is due to a number of factors, including climate change, decreased output, low supply, and the threat of tariffs, Sprudge noted. That’s not being helped by Brazilian producers, who are happy to hold on to unsold coffee while the price continues to skyrocket. About 85 percent of Brazil’s coffee has already been sold, but the remaining 15 percent is being held back for now. (Brazil is home to about half of the world’s Arabica.)
While the trend may be concerning to coffee lovers around the world, some in the industry think that prices may begin to fall sooner rather than later. “There are those who believe the next Brazilian harvest could be better than expected, not so much as to exceed last year’s, but enough to make the outlook a little brighter,” the trader Icona Cafe told Reuters.
Coffee isn’t the only product to see its cost go through the roof in recent months. Cocoa has experienced a similar trajectory, leading to higher chocolate prices around the world. While cocoa prices have dropped some since a peak during the holiday season, they now sit at about $10,000 a ton—far more than the $2,000 they sat at in 2022.
With coffee itself being more expensive, though, it’s not like we can drown our sorrows in a cup of joe anymore.
