Cocoa futures are down 40% since hitting an all-time high of $11,772 last month. The agricultural commodity has taken a beating on better-than-expected supply in Nigeria and slumping demand in the futures market. Still, despite the selloff this month, the crop is up 70% year-to-date.

July cocoa futures fell $51.00, or 0.71%, to $7,115 per metric ton on Monday on the US ICE Futures exchange. Cocoa is coming off a 6% weekly loss and is down 33% over the last month. Over the last 12 months, cocoa prices have rocketed 140%.

In April, cocoa advanced to a record high of $11,722 per metric ton.

Cocoa prices have spiked this year due to a combination of heavy rains, crop disease, aging inventories, and dilapidated transportation and infrastructure in West Africa. Export projections from Ghana and the Ivory Coast had been extremely bullish for the cocoa market.

The spike in prices is also expected to boost prices at the supermarket for shoppers.

That said, market analysts say that waning investor interest could be the primary driver of the drop in cocoa prices.

As FX Daily Report recently noted:

“According to data from the Commodity Futures Trading Commission’s Commitments of Traders (COT), net-long futures positions for cocoa fell to a 14-month low of 29,584 contracts. The peak was 133,986 contracts in January 2024.”

Despite global supplies expected to be tight for the foreseeable future, conditions might already be baked into the cake in the futures market. Reports suggest that investors are utilizing algorithms to predict cocoa futures as hedge funds walk away from this corner of the market.

In other agricultural products, June corn futures climbed $0.05, or 1.01%, to $4.745 per bushel. June wheat futures increased $0.3025, or 4.56%, to $6.9375 a bushel. June soybean futures picked up $0.0275, or 0.23%, to $12.2175 per bushel.