Tag Archives Commodities

I imagine one particular analyst wasn’t jumping up and down and offering Thanksgiving praise on Friday morning, as the agricultural futures markets shot through the roof and began setting two year highs. He was the guy whose ag market analysis appeared in an email mail-out I always get Friday mornings. Unfortunately for the analysts it […] Read more

The ag markets have exploded today, following the USDA’s report this morning that predicts a drop in expected corn 2010-11 carryout stocks to 902 million bushels. USDA also reduced the size of the soybean crop and lowered the expected carryout, shocking traders who had expected the opposite. The market reaction has been tremendous, with most […] Read more

There’s been an enormous amount of sturm und drang ever since the United States Department of Agriculture last week tripped over a 7.6 million tonne pile of corn it hadn’t seen. It’s the kind of finding that can change the sentiment in a market. As our markets section editor, D’Arce McMillan, notes in his column […] Read more

Wanna know what the prairie crop looked like a month ago? Then go look at today’s Statistics Canada crop production report. Wanna know what the prairie crop looks like today? Chuck the report in the recycling bin and make some calls, because this thing’s as outdated as Mash re-runs. That’s not Stats Can’s fault: they […] Read more

So what’s really behind the recent rally in crop prices? And what does that mean anyway? That’s what I’m wondering looking at the overall commodity complex rally and the coincident crop market rally. So often we get so deeply immersed in our little agricultural commodities that we don’t look further afield to see what’s happening […] Read more

In the financial advice biz, there’s an important rule known as KYC. No, that’s not a misspelling of Kentucky Fried Chicken, which is now just KFC. Since the 1990s. (A whole generation of kids doesn’t know what KFC used to stand for, other than greasy chicken). It’s Know Your Client. What that means is you […] Read more

Grain growers often care little about the profit situation of the livestock producers around them. And livestock producers often don’t give a tinker’s dam about the situation of grain growers. With the two big sides of the ag industry being generally inversely related in terms of profitability, that makes sense to a degree. Grain growers […] Read more

So, canola’s broken above a medium-term resistance point that had many wondering if it had topped. That much we know. Here is that breakout on the chart: Since mid-summer canola’s been bouncing off that $470 ceiling, and this breakout to the upside is fantastic. So why’s it happening? You may think that’s a silly question, […] Read more

The numbers look nice in the most recent Canadian Wheat Board Pool Return Outlook: 2010-11 Number One CWRS 13.5 has jumped from $7.57 per bushel last month (before deductions) to $8.16 today. Durum is up 30-40 cents per bushel, with 1 CWAD moving from $6.61 last month to $6.99. But that good news doesn’t mean […] Read more

I’m in Saskatoon at The Western Producer’s annual editorial conference. It’s a chance to catch up with colleagues and for those of us who live in the network of far-flung news bureaus to get up to speed with developments here at our imperial headquarters. I must say it’s nice to be part of a newspaper […] Read more