Cocoa Futures Hit 2-Year Lows

2026-01-20 12:53 By Luisa Carvalho 1 min. read

Cocoa prices dropped to around $4,400 per tonne, hitting the lowest since January 2024, following reports of excess beans piling up at ports in top producer Ivory Coast.

The surplus came amid a shortage of government export licenses and after the cocoa regulator set this season’s farmgate price at a high level, which also spurred an influx of beans from Ghana, Liberia, and Guinea.

Port deliveries in the Ivory Coast totaled 37,000 tons between January 12 and January 18, up from 34,000 tons in the same week last season.

Meanwhile, local farmers reported adequate rainfall and soil moisture last week, supporting the development of the April-to-September mid-crop.

On the demand side, recent data showed European cocoa grinding fell 8.3% y/y to 304,470 tons in Q4, worse than market forecasts of a 2.9% drop.

In Asia, cocoa grindings fell 4.8% to 197,022 MT, less than the expected 12% decline, while North American grindings rose 0.3% to 103,117 MT, mainly to the the addition of two new plants.



News Stream
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