The Periodic Table of Commodity Returns
From Visual Capitalist:
If for some reason, you still think that the commodity markets are
predictable, today’s chart provides a nice piece of humble pie.
The Periodic Table of Commodity Returns, which comes to us annually from our friends at U.S. Global Investors, shows the returns of commodities over each year of the past decade.
As you may have guessed, commodities are a volatile asset class – and
as a result, their respective rankings fluctuate wildly each year,
making things really interesting for any observer.
The Year in Review
In 2017, we experienced the second full year of recovery from the collapse of commodities that plagued the dreaded stretch from 2011 to 2015.
Aside from natural gas (-20.7%), commodities were basically up across
the board. The graphic, which focuses mostly on major commodity
markets, has palladium (56.3%), aluminum (32.4%), coal (31.2%), copper
(30.5%), and zinc (30.5%) as the big winners over the last year.
It’s worth mentioning that some smaller markets are not included on the table – and battery metals like cobalt (133%) also did exceptionally well in 2017.
Deeper Digging
If you are not yet thoroughly geeked out, there is an interactive version of this graphic as well. It allows you to sort by category, performance, or volatility.
Surprisingly, the least volatile substance on the table is gold:...MORE
