Hired Trading houses expanding into new commodities markets were quick to pounce on Viterra staff not needed by Glencore
Reading Time: 2 minutes Reuters / Top oil trader Vitol is building a global grains desk and has taken advantage of Glencore’s takeover of Canadian grains giant Viterra to hire a team of its traders, trading sources said Feb. 20. Vitol, which has an annual turnover of nearly $300 billion, will vie for market share along with rival trading […] Read moreVitol plans grain market debut, hires Viterra traders
Oats market at equilibrium, lower acreage likely
Reading Time: 2 minutes Oats bids in Western Canada are holding steady despite tightening stocks, as supply and demand have reached an equilibrium for the time being. If prices don’t see some improvement relative to other cropping options, a decline in acres is seen as likely in 2013. Basis levels for oats in Western Canada are historically strong, but […] Read more
Tight stocks mean canola exports and crush must slow down
Soybeans Combined production from Brazil and Argentina now forecast to increase by 28 per cent from last year
Reading Time: 3 minutes Old-crop canola futures climbed higher at ICE Futures Canada during the week ended Feb. 8, hitting levels not seen since mid-September before running into profit-taking resistance to the upside. Dwindling stocks in Western Canada are the primary driver in the market, but canola is still only one oilseed among many in the broader market and […] Read morePost-monopoly reflections on the new age of grain marketing
OK so far Just how accurate were those horror stories about grain marketing post-CWB monopoly?
Reading Time: 4 minutes Much has been written about how farmers will market their grains in the post-single-desk world. Horror stories abound about how the grain companies won’t take the CWB contracts until they have filled their own, pools won’t reflect fair market prices, and farmers won’t have the expertise to market in the new climate. Now that we […] Read moreCanola bounces off of support and resumes the uptrend
MAP Reading a chart is like reading a road map. It not only tells you where you are, it tells you where you are going
Reading Time: 3 minutes After dropping $90/tonne from the high of $657.50 in September, at the time of this writing, prices on the March 2013 canola futures contract have rallied $50/tonne since the USDA report was released on January 11, 2013. Thanks to phenomenal demand and improving basis levels, cash prices are back to the crop-year high ($14.50/bushel). For […] Read moreICE’s canola futures climb higher on lower loonie
StatsCan Some traders expect the agency to boost canola stocks in the report to be issued Feb. 5
Reading Time: 3 minutes The unexpected drop in the value of the Canadian dollar helped canola futures on the ICE Futures Canada trading platform push upward during the week ended Jan. 25. The weak Canadian unit had the benefit of sparking some aggressive buying from both the domestic and export sectors. As if by cue, there were unconfirmed reports […] Read moreStatsCan’s final estimates point to tight canola supply
Reading Time: 3 minutes ICE Futures Canada canola contracts moved up and down during the week ended Dec. 7, finishing only a little bit firmer overall. The $600-per-tonne level was the key chart point to watch in the nearby January contract, as the futures made a brief attempt to climb above that psychological level before backing away. If the […] Read more
Barley prices seen as holding for the next while
Opportunity Good barley prices present an opportunity to get rotations away from canola
Reading Time: 3 minutes The drought in the U.S. has hit corn supplies hard and boosted barley prices, a situation that’s likely to persist at least into next summer, says at Alberta Agriculture provincial crops market analyst. Charlie Pearson says the markets make this winter a good time to think about extending rotations that have been shortened to focus […] Read moreCanola futures see downward price action
WILD CARD There’s lots of potential for markets to move either up or down based on what happens with weather, currency and seeded acres
Reading Time: 3 minutes Canola futures on the ICE Canada platform experienced some weakness during the week ended Nov. 9 with the bearishly construed USDA supply-demand balance tables for soybeans encouraging some of the downward price action. A larger-than-anticipated U.S. soyoil ending stocks estimate from the USDA added to the bearish sentiment in canola. The unloading of positions by […] Read moreCME buys Kansas City exchange
Next step Deal expected to boost trading of hard red winter wheat and may put Minneapolis Grain Exchange in play
Reading Time: 2 minutes Reuters / CME Group is buying the Kansas City Board of Trade for $126 million in cash, cementing CME’s dominance in world grain futures markets and keeping rival IntercontinentalExchange from gaining an important foothold. It is CME’s first exchange purchase in five years since it wrapped up a buying spree that put the Chicago Mercantile […] Read moreCyber-Savvy Farmer
