On Thursday the Prairie Oats Growers Association (POGA) is holding its annual convention and the market hasn’t been offering much to them recently to be happy about.
All crops have fallen since the start of October, but the plunge has been particularly bad for oats. It’s futures prices at the Chicago Board of Trade has not only fallen from $3.20 per bushel to around $2.00, but its downward path has been sickeningly steady, grinding lower and lower and lower.
A number of other crops have leveled out and are offering hope that perhaps the bottom has been reached for this year, but until today there’s been little reason to sense that with oats. Today oats seems a little perkier than the other main crops in Chicago, but it takes more than a perky morning to turn a market around.
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Many farmers contract their oats production each year. Many don’t. Some years contractors make better money. Other years those who choose to ride the lightning of the unpriced market do better. In the past year anyone selling cash between March and September did pretty well, as did anyone who locked in futures prices in the spring through contracts or otherwise. At the peak in July, December futures hit $4.80. But anyone sitting on unpriced oats right now is probably feeling the blues.
No doubt Thursday in Yorkton oats growers will be keenly listening to the two market analysts who are offering their two-cents on the outlook.
