High-End Coffee Beans Are Surging as ‘Serious’ Deficit Looms
- A shortfall is projected even before Brazil’s frost season
- IMF boosts global economic growth in lift to demand outlook
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Futures for arabica coffee, the type used in lattes and flat whites at cafes like Starbucks Corp., are surging on signs that a global supply deficit is widening.
The world will be short 7.5 million bags for the this season’s crop cycle, following an outlook for reduced output in top grower Brazil, according to Citigroup analysts including Aakash Doshi. Frost is a threat to Brazilian coffee groves between June and August, and coffee traders including Volcafe, a unit of ED&F Man, and Marex Spectron are seeing even bigger world bean shortfalls coming in October.