La dynamique des prix et des marchés de matières premières : analyses univariées versus faits stylisés analytiques

In several very recent IMF Staff Papers, researchers of the Fund team working on the development of commodity world prices provide statistical characteristics of a range of prices qualifying them as stylized facts, and associate them with a purely statistical definition of the life cycle of the price of a primary commodity. This article contrasts in a synthetic way this method of univariate and temporal analysis with the previous extensive literature which concentrates on the analysis of price and market dynamics of primary commodities. It demonstrates the interest generated rather by analytical stylized facts and offers five dealing with a series of pluri-annual price fluctuations, and two concerning the medium-term regulation of international markets.