Palladium rallies 3% as dollar stabilizes

Palladium prices rose on Tuesday as the dollar stabilized against most major rivals ahead of important US inflation data.

Investors await the US consumer prices data later this week to gather more clues on the likely path ahead for the Federal Reserve’s monetary policy. 

Palladium is used in cars, especially diesel cars to reduce exhaust fumes. 

However, increased demand on electric cars hurt demand on diesel cars, and in turn hurt palladium demand. 

Palladium prices suffered noticeable losses in 2023 due to lower demand on catalytic converters in cars, which rely on palladium. 

Palladium is a widely available mineral, with 0.015 parts in a million share of the earth’s crust, and it’s usually produced as a byproduct of refining copper and nickel. 

Palladium prices reached a peak of $3440 in March 2022 after the Russian invasion of Ukraine, which curtailed supplies. 

Since then, prices collapsed noticeably to below $1500 as demand on EV cars spike worldwide, threatening the existence of diesel cars and their palladium-based catalytic converters. 

Otherwise, the dollar index stabilized at 104.1 as of 17:33 GMT, with a session-high at 104.2, and a low at 103.8.

Palladium June futures rallied 3.1% as of 17:34 GMT to $1,083.5 an ounce.