Market Watch

There are better days ahead for the cattle industry, says Purdue University Extension marketing specialist Chris Hurt:
“As numbers keep dropping, producers adjust inventories downward in the face of high feed and forage prices. At mid-year, the number of all cattle and calves was modestly lower than the two previous years, with total inventories near the [...]

Corn and soybean prices continue to weaken, but could settle into a more “sideways” pattern as production prospects unfold, according to University of Illinois Extension marketing specialist Darrel Good.
December 2008 corn futures increased about $2 per bushel during the month of June, topping out just under $8. During the same period, November 2008 soybean futures [...]

There is a lot of the growing season left, but current crop and weather conditions suggest the possibility for further weakness in corn and soybean prices in the near term, according to University of Illinois Extension marketing specialist Darrel Good.
“Crop condition ratings and our crop weather model suggest that the U.S. average yield could be [...]

Extraordinary losses for pork producers in 2008 may be offset by extraordinary profits in the last half of 2009 and 2010, according to Purdue University Extension marketing specialist Chris Hurt:
This will be especially true if Conservation Reserve Program (CRP) land is relapsed in 2009, if ethanol receives less support, if 2009 weather is favorable, and [...]

excerpted from Market and Price Analysis: The Agricultural Industries
by Dale C. Dahl and Jerome W. Hammond
McGraw-Hill, 1977
History
Futures trading developed in response to several trading needs. It has been used to assure the seller of an outlet for a stored commodity, to assure the buyer of a supply of the commodity in the short production season, [...]