Investment firm US Global Investors has put together a neat new interactive chart of the price of different commodities over the last decade.
It shows just what a fickle market commodities can be with wild price swings from year to year.
While natural gas was not surprisingly the worst performer over the last decade, and top honours go to palladium’s showing since January 2004, some of the price movements in metals are unexpected when displayed in this way.
In 2013 investors in gold suffered their worst year since 1980 as the price plunged more than 28% and gold was also twice the best performing commodity over the last decade.
Yet year-to-year price swing in gold made it the least volatile of all commodities, although its relationship with silver is pretty stormy:
Those hoping for a pick-up in the price thanks to top producer Indonesia’s intervention in the market would probably already know that the prize for the most volatile of all commodities this past decade goes to nickel:
Copper, long thought of as the bellwether for the the metals sector, has had its ups and downs as well over the years as well, going from a 56% loss in 2008 to a stomach churning 153% gain the following year:
Click here for the US Global Investors Commodity Periodic Table