Index of Commodity Prices June 2016

Preliminary estimates for June indicate that the index declined by 0.4 per cent (on a monthly average basis) in SDR terms, after increasing by 0.4 per cent in May (revised).The largest contributor to the decline in June was the price of iron ore. Both the base metals and rural subindices increased in the month. In Australian dollar terms, the index fell by 1.6 per cent in June.

Over the past year, the index has fallen by 9.9 per cent in SDR terms, led by declines in the prices of base metals and bulk commodities. The index has fallen by 5.7 per cent in Australian dollar terms over the past year.

Consistent with previous releases, preliminary estimates for iron ore, coking coal, thermal coal and LNG export prices are being used for the most recent months, based on market information. Using spot prices for the bulk commodities, the index fell by 1.6 per cent in June in SDR terms, to be 11.2 per cent lower over the past year.

For further details regarding the construction of the index, please refer to ‘Changes to the RBA Index of Commodity Prices: 2013’ in the March 2013 issue of the Bulletin and ‘Weights for the Index of Commodity Prices’ (April 2016).

Commodity Prices - I2