Examining prices of crude oil, gold, natural gas, copper and wheat. Each marker names a world event — click it to read what happened, with dates and sources. The chart stays on the left; four findings from the numbers scroll on the right.
Click any marker to open the event · hover the chart to read exact values.
Click any marker to open the event · hover the chart to read exact values.
Relationships in the same data, measured on month-to-month price changes across the full period.
01 · Volatility
By the size of monthly price changes, natural gas is the most volatile, at about 45% a year, and crude oil is next at 42%. Gold is the steadiest at 17%. Energy prices move far more than metals or wheat.
02 · Co-movement
Month to month, the commodities are only weakly related. No pair has a correlation above 0.3, and the strongest link is between gold and copper. Each price is driven mainly by its own supply and demand.
03 · Crisis
The weak links tighten in a downturn. From their 2008 peaks to the trough, natural gas fell 72%, oil 69%, copper 65% and wheat 50%. Gold fell only 21%, then rose to record highs.
04 · Long run
In nominal dollars, gold is worth about 121 times its 1970 price and crude oil about 68 times. Copper and wheat rose far less, about 8 and 5 times. Adjusted for inflation, only the strongest gained real value.