FT, please, don’t spill the beans about the risks of cocoa to the Basel Committee.

Sir, Emiko Terazono quotes Derek Chambers of Sucres & Denrés saying “If you’ve got a piece of land, do you grow cocoa which needs a lot of labor and is prone to disease, or something [like palm oil and rubber] that doesn´t need a lot of work and produces money every couple of months”, “Cocoa deficit puts squeeze on chocolatiers” June 24.

Holy moly! He better not tell that to the bank regulators in the Basel Committee since then, consistent with their actions, they would, even though banks already have cleared for those risks, immediately impose higher capital requirements on banks when financing cocoa than when financing palm oil, rubber or arabica coffee… because “it is oh so risky and we can’t have our banks financing that”, and then we would really see a squeeze being placed on chocolatiers.