Chocoholics Won’t Be the Only Victims of Cocoa’s Surge

In every sustained commodity price rally, there’s a moment when fundamentals — supply, demand, inventories — no longer matter. The cost of the molecules, whether in the form of energy or foodstuffs or metals, stops being a price and becomes just a number. The market ceases to be orderly and becomes unruly.

It’s clear that moment has arrived for cocoa. On Tuesday, cocoa futures in New York surged above the previously unthinkable $10,000 a metric ton. In dollar terms, they surged more than $1,000 over two days — equal to the trading range that in the past would have taken a year to witness.