EINNEWS, December 2—Financial speculators are in hot water with Starbucks’ CEO who accuses them of brewing up an artificially high price for coffee.
Speaking at a meeting of analysts and investors in New York, Howard Schultz, Starbucks’ CEO, said “There is no evidence whatsoever that we can see that there’s any supply and demand issue.”
Coffee prices have spiked to near record highs in recent weeks. The price of Arabica coffee in futures trading is up nearly 50 percent from where it was just a year ago. Cocoa prices also are surging.
Schultz called the price run-ups “tragic.” He said, “This is financial speculation at its worst.”
Starbucks, the biggest coffee shop chain in the world, has weathered the price increase by raising the price of its large-sized and labor-intensive drinks.
One of the most contentious issues of recent financial regulation was the role of financial speculation by big players in commodity markets. Regulators are mulling ways to implement new authority granted them in the new overhaul legislation. Read more news about coffee prices at http://beverages.einnews.com/news/coffee-prices.
For more beverages news, visit Beverage Industry Today (http://beverages.einnews.com), a beverages media monitoring service from EIN News.
