Monthly commodity prices update for April 2025

The monthly update of PricePedia commodity prices for April 2025 has been published.
In the first four months of the current year, the prices in US dollars of core industrial commodities increased by +6.5%. Prices in euros, however, decreased overall by -0.6%. The factor driving the different dynamics between euro and dollar prices was the depreciation of the US dollar, which moved from an exchange rate of 1.02 euros at the beginning of January to 1.14 euros at the end of April 2025.

The depreciation of the US currency occurred in a context of high uncertainty, amplified by the implementation, during the first 100 days of the second Trump administration, of a protectionist trade policy by the United States (see the article Liberation or Ruination Day? A storm of tariffs on commodity markets).

As illustrated in the article How tariffs reshape markets: the effect on commodity prices, at present the effects of such policies are being transmitted to commodity prices mainly through the macroeconomic channel.

The following chart shows the evolution of euro-denominated raw material prices in Europe for the main PricePedia aggregates: Commodity^[1], Industrials^[2], Energy, and Food, with January 2022 levels as the base (100).

In aggregate, euro-denominated commodity prices in April 2025 show an overall decrease of -4% compared to the previous month.
This trend is marked by a drop in prices across all sub-aggregates, including Food, which recorded a month-on-month change of -3%. The steepest decline, amounting to -7.5%, was seen in the Energy segment, led by oil prices.

Industrial raw material prices in April 2025

As for industrial commodities, prices in euros declined overall by -1.2% in April 2025 compared to March 2025, falling slightly below August 2023 levels.

The following illustrates the month-on-month changes, in euro terms, of the commodity groups that make up the PricePedia Industrials index.

Non-Ferrous Metals, along with oil prices, are the products where the macroeconomic channel effects are most evident, and they posted by far the sharpest monthly decrease, at -6%.
In contrast, the other commodity groups in the Industrials index showed relative price stability, with changes being modest and never exceeding, in absolute value, 1.5%.