Everything from beer cans to party balloons...

The closure of the Strait of Hormuz, to say nothing of damage to some of the world's largest smelters, has aluminum prices skyrocketing.

Aluminium prices are at a four-year high, up more than 25% this year, as war in the Middle East and a blocked Strait of Hormuz choke off nearly a quarter of the world’s seaborne metal supply.

Not just aluminum, though. The global helium supply has been kneecapped as well, which will impact everything from microchip manufacturing to MRIs.

The war has also upended markets for products extracted from natural gas. Among the most critical is helium, an odorless element produced as a byproduct of natural gas extraction. Before the war, Qatar supplied roughly one-third of the world’s helium.

Chip manufacturers use it to cool machines that etch circuits onto silicon wafers. Pharmaceutical companies rely on it for quality checks of their products. In magnetic resonance imaging machines, helium cools superconducting magnets.

I've already had a couple people tell me that even though prices on everything from portable electronics to memory cards for cameras is up, if I have any I need to buy, I shouldn't be waiting for Christmas because it's going to be a year minimum once the shooting stops for things to even start getting back to normal.

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