The world coffee price can jump by half without the shelf price of a pack moving in the same proportion or at the same moment. Between the bean quoted on the exchange and the cup, a long chain absorbs and…
The coffee tree bears in alternation: a heavy crop exhausts the plant, which yields less the following year before rebounding. This biennial cycle offers a purely cyclical explanation for price records, competing with the climate thesis. TL;DR Alternate bearing layers…
Arabica is a species with a narrow thermal window, tethered to altitude. Warming does not merely shift its growing zone — it shrinks it, which underpins the hypothesis of a structural fragility in supply. TL;DR Arabica's reliance on cool, high-altitude…
Vietnam became the world’s leading robusta producer within a few decades. When its harvest falters, world supply of the species tightens and the price gap with arabica narrows. TL;DR Within a few decades Vietnam came to dominate robusta; its 2023-2024…
Brazil supplies on its own about a third of the world’s coffee, mostly as arabica. That concentration makes its weather the leading determinant of the species’ price, which a localised frost or drought is enough to propel. TL;DR Brazil grows…
The world coffee market does not trade a single product but two distinct botanical species, arabica and robusta, with opposite growing requirements and quoted separately on two different exchanges. TL;DR Arabica and robusta are two botanical species with opposite temperaments,…
The arabica–robusta spread is a variable, not a fixed quality premium: it narrowed toward parity during the 2024 robusta surge, then re-opened to $1.77/lb at arabica’s February 2025 record. Sources: ICE Coffee ‘C’ (New York), ICE robusta (London). Coffee trades…
