October Precious Metals Report

Commodities continued to push higher through the first half of September before beginning a modest retreat over the second half of the month that ultimately brought the Reuters–Jefferies CRB index to an unchanged reading for the period. (See the boxed-in area in our chart below). However, for the third quarter as a whole, the CRB was up some 9%, its best quarterly showing in nearly 2 years. Brent ended up nearly 15% over the quarter, while copper, gold, and many of the grains had stellar performances as well. Sugar bucked the trend, losing 10% over the period and along with coffee, is now the worst performing commodity year-to-date. (We plot the 2012 returns of various commodities in our chart on the next page; silver, soybeans, and wheat are among the winners so far this year, with the “tropicals” bringing up the rear).

Click the link below to read the full report.