The Bloomberg Commodities price index is at almost 95, up from 65 one year ago, an increase of almost 50%. Copper and steel, but also palladium (+41%), silver (+63%) show record highs. Timber prices have quadrupled in one year, oil has doubled, pushing gas, plastic, insulators and bitumen (+16%) up. Oil prices are also pushing biofuels up: maize (+107%) and sugar cane (+47%).
Building construction costs are now endangering the entire sector, whose contracts were generally stipulated years ago and firms cannot cover costs now, but EU governments seem to let “creative destruction” go ahead.
