CTRM

The supply chains for bulk commodities, including agricultural, metals/ores and some energies, are complex – usually necessitating transport

Sugar is a global commodity, with almost 180 million metric tons being produced in more than 120 countries each year. Though much of the sug

In an era that is likely to be dominated by the energy transition, metals are set to become the new foundation of modern society. As more of everything is powered by clean electricity, demand for metals will pick up with everything from greater quantities of base metals needed to make batteries to store it all the way through to copper for the cables to carry it. Other metals like iron in the form of steel, along with rare earth elements and speciality metals, will all also be needed in ever greater quantities to support electrification and construction. Metals like Lithium, Cobalt, Manganese, Zinc, Mercury, Silver, Cadmium are the key components of many types of battery along with Graphite in some instance.

Renewable energy certificates or ‘RECs’ have become the currency of the renewable power industry, allowing power providers to expand their product offerings and offer ‘green’ power irrespective of whether or not they can physically generate it. RECs also assure consumers who opt to buy renewable power, that that power has either come directly from a renewable generator, or if a renewable generator is not servicing their facility, that it is offset in the market by power from a renewable source, such as wind, solar or hydro, in another geographic area.

Liquified natural gas (LNG) has been a traded commodity for more than a century. But only in the last couple of decades has the market expanded to meet the ever-increasing demand for energy, through low carbon emissions energy sources. With the development of the massive Qatar LNG facilities in the mid-1990s and the increasing demand for imported gas, global LNG trading has grown from about 50 MTPA in 1990 to more than 350 MTPA in 2020.

Over the years, there has been a growing realization that building a commodity trading and risk management (CTRM) solution is not a trivial task. Indeed, quite the opposite. It is a hugely complex piece of software that can never seem to meet all the varied needs of all the different types of companies buying and selling commodities around the globe.

While it is commonly believed that the pandemic was a black swan event, according to most risk experts it wasn’t. As they point out, the COVID Pandemic was an event that was foreseeable in its occurrence, though perhaps not in its timing. Despite being (thankfully) rare, these types of events do occur and bring with them an increased awareness of the importance of proper and holistic risk management practices, not only as it applies to external risks (as the pandemic was), but also commercial and internal risks as well.

The global market for CTRM (Commodity Trading and Risk Management) software solutions that cater specifically for metals and ores trading and risk management is the third largest among the major commodity groupings of energy, ags & softs, and metals, at an estimated $174m in expenditures in 2019 according to ComTech’s most recent market sizing report. It is also among the most complex of these markets in terms of its functional requirements, especially in areas like concentrates and ores. Complexity is also found throughout the supply chain. Perhaps these are just some of the reasons why the metals market for CTRM and CM (Commodity Management) software have been underserved by commercially available solutions in the past.