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(NEW YORK) — Valentine’s Day shoppers may feel jilted by runaway chocolate prices.
Chocolate prices soared 14.4% over the initial weeks of 2026 when compared to the same period a year earlier, nearly doubling the pace of price increases at the start of 2025, according to findings shared with ABC News by intelligence firm Datasembly.
The sharp rise in chocolate prices owes to a cocoa shortage caused primarily by adverse weather and crop disease in West Africa, which accounts for about 70% of the world’s cocoa, some analysts told ABC News.
The dearth of cocoa, analysts said, has ratcheted up input costs for chocolate makers and vaulted retail prices, leading to sticker shock in grocery and candy store aisles.
“There is a record gap between supply and demand,” David Branch, sector manager at the Wells Fargo Agri-Food Institute, told ABC News.
Raw cocoa bean prices have risen dramatically in recent years due to the choke in supply. A metric ton of cocoa beans cost as much $12,000 last year, Branch said. Before the COVID-19 pandemic, cocoa bean prices hovered between $2,000 and $2,500 per metric ton, International Monetary Fund data shows.
In recent months, supply problems have begun to ease, bringing cocoa bean costs down significantly from last year’s peak. A metric ton of cocoa beans now runs about $3,700.
Still, chocolate prices remain highly elevated as chocolate makers sell through candy made with cocoa beans bought earlier, analysts said.
“A lot of manufacturers bought cocoa when prices were high and that’s still very much moving through the supply chain,” David Ortega, a food economist at Michigan State University, told ABC News.
In November, the White House announced framework trade agreements with some Latin American countries in an attempt to ease surging prices for grocery staples such as cocoa. While the U.S. imports a significant share of cocoa from West Africa, supply also comes from Latin American countries like Ecuador, the U.S. Department of Agriculture says.
“Today’s announcements underscore the Administration’s unwavering commitment to fair and balanced trade at every opportunity to protect and strengthen our economic and national security,” the White House said when it unveiled the framework agreements.
Prices remain high for some other imported food items, such as coffee and beef.
Coffee prices surged about 18% in January compared to a year earlier, while ground beef prices climbed more than 17% over that span, Bureau of Labor Statistics data on Friday showed.
Grocery prices are rising at a faster pace than prices overall, climbing 2.9% over the year ending in January, according to BLS data.
Chocolate price hikes will likely ease over the coming months, some analysts said, noting the eventual pass through of lower cocoa prices into the cost of chocolate bought at stores. Analysts emphasized, however, the uncertainty surrounding the outlook due to the chance of weather-related challenges for growers.
Branch, of Wells Fargo, said chocolate prices could even fall by the latter part of this year as manufacturers find cost relief and pass it along to shoppers.
“If market trends stay where they are, we’ll see lower prices for Halloween,” Branch said.
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