PricePedia Scenario for March 2026

In a phase like the current one, characterized by geopolitical tensions and conflicts that are generating strong volatility in energy commodity prices, it is essential for manufacturing firms to rely on continuously updated forecasting scenarios.
In commodity markets, sudden changes in the conditions underlying any scenario can significantly alter the expected path of key exogenous variables and, consequently, the prices of input materials along production supply chains.

As described in the article The advantage of having timely updated forecasts, the PricePedia Scenario is characterized by the following elements:

1. exogenous variables (such as the price of oil, copper, and other economic indicators), whose future evolution is estimated by combining forecasts produced by specialized institutions with the expectations of financial market participants derived from futures price curves. The latter are particularly useful for updating exogenous variables in the presence of sudden shocks, such as the current energy shock;
2. dynamically specified models that combine economic theory with robust statistical tools.

In particular, the analysis of relationships among different commodities along production chains makes it possible to understand how shocks in the costs of production inputs (for example energy costs) are transmitted to prices throughout the entire supply chain.

The March 2026 PricePedia Scenario

In the PricePedia Scenario, updated with the information available as of March 5, 2026, the energy commodity shocks described in the article Effects of the conflict in Iran on financial commodity prices are expected to result in an interruption of the downward trend in European prices of purchased materials.
Assuming the conflict does not become prolonged, the oil price is expected to fall back below 80 dollars per barrel as early as June and then gradually decline, closing the year slightly above 70 dollars per barrel. In this scenario, the energy price index is projected to increase by +2.6% on average in 2026, resulting in a modest increase of +0.5% in the overall aggregate of commodities analyzed by PricePedia.

The expected price dynamics are reported in the table below, which shows the annual percentage changes (in euro terms) of the main commodity aggregates included in the PricePedia Scenario: Industrials^[1], Commodity^[2], Energy, and Food.

Table 1: Annual Growth Rates (%) of PricePedia Aggregate Indices, in Euro

The effects generated by the increase in energy commodity costs are expected to be transmitted significantly to the prices of industrial commodities: in 2026, the average quotations of these goods are projected to increase by +3.8% compared with the previous year. Moreover, these effects are expected to persist even as energy prices are forecast to cool in 2027, when they are projected to decline by -9% year on year.

As for the overall Food aggregate, prices are more strongly influenced by the dynamics of tropical goods, which are expected to decline sharply over the next 24 months due to improving supply conditions. However, it is worth noting that energy commodity effects are also being transmitted, for example, to vegetable oils through the substitution channel between these products and biofuels. Average prices of oils and fats are therefore expected to increase by almost +6% on average over the 2026-2027 period.

How the Scenario is evolving

To obtain an initial measure of how the shock in energy commodities is being transmitted to European commodity prices, it is useful to compare the current scenario with the previous one.

For this purpose, the charts below present a comparison between the current scenario and the previously published one, both for energy commodities and industrial commodities.

Scenario Comparison

Energy Total Index (Europe)

Industrials Index (Europe)

Both charts show that the current scenario implies higher prices than the previous one. This is particularly evident for energy commodities, which were previously expected to stabilize in 2027 at levels similar to those of 2019. The current forecast instead indicates that in 2027 prices will remain more than +13% above the average levels recorded in 2019.

An equally significant revision concerns the industrial commodities scenario: previously, growth in 2026 was expected to be around +1%, compared with the current +3.8%.
For 2027, the growth profile remains broadly similar to that of the previous scenario (respectively +2.5% and +2.3%); however, the stronger increase expected in 2026 results in higher projected price levels.

Conclusions

Within just a few weeks, the expected price trajectory has changed significantly, pushing upward the projected price levels along production supply chains. The comparison between the currently published PricePedia Scenario and the previous one highlights how rapidly commodity market outlooks can shift when underlying conditions change, particularly in sectors most exposed to geopolitical tensions such as energy.

In a context characterized by high uncertainty and frequent exogenous shocks, having continuously updated forecasting scenarios becomes a critical element for manufacturing companies. Continuous monitoring of the variables that drive commodity markets makes it possible to detect scenario changes promptly and anticipate their effects on procurement costs and purchasing strategies.