LBMA's Sister, With a Narrower Job
The LPPM formed alongside the LBMA in the same era and shares much of its membership and its ICE-run auction technology, but its remit stops at two metals: platinum and palladium.
Priced by Auction, Twice a Day
Like LBMA's gold price, the LPPM Platinum and Palladium Price is set by an electronic auction: participants submit buy and sell volumes at a proposed price, the price adjusts until supply and demand roughly balance, and the process repeats until it converges on a number everyone can settle contracts against.
A Market Run by Catalytic Converters, Not Jewellers
Platinum and palladium demand is dominated by automotive catalytic converters, which clean vehicle exhaust, rather than investment or jewellery the way gold is. That means LPPM prices move on car production numbers and emissions regulations far more than on wedding season or safe-haven buying.
Two Countries Hold the Cards
South Africa supplies roughly seventy percent of the world's mined platinum, and Russia's Nornickel is the dominant palladium producer — so LPPM prices are unusually sensitive to single-country events, from South African power cuts hitting mine output to sanctions risk around Russian supply.
Palladium actually traded above gold for most of 2019–2022 — a first in the metal's history — purely because tightening emissions rules made it more valuable under a car's hood than around someone's neck.
