The first decade of the 21st century has perhaps witnessed more structural change in commodity futures markets than all previous decades combined. Not only have trading volumes and open interest increased markedly, but this time period also saw historic changes in both trading and participants....

The traditional necessary condition for futures market inefficiency is the existence of alternative forecasting methods that produce mean squared forecast errors smaller than the futures market. Here, a more exacting requirement for futures market efficiency is proposed-forecast encompassing....

The purpose of this research report is to summarize the pricing performance of professional market advisory services for the 1995-2001 corn and soybean crops. First, advisory programs in corn do not consistently beat market benchmarks, but they do consistently beat the farmer benchmark. Second,...

Theoretical noise trader models suggest that uninformed traders can impact market prices. However, these models' conclusions depend crucially on the assumed specification for noise trader demand. This research seeks to empirically determine the appropriate demand specification for uninformed...

Mailbox milk prices from a representative dairy operation in Illinois are used to gauge the farm-level hedging effectiveness of Class III milk futures. The results indicate a hedge ratio of 0.85 can reduce price risk by over 90%. The importance of seasonal basis components is highlighted.

The purpose of this research bulletin is to summarize the pricing performance of professional market advisory services for the 1995-2000 corn and soybean crops. The pricing performance results over 1995-2000 suggest several key findings. First, advisory programs in corn do not consistently beat...

Uma vez que o pecuarista decide-se por utilizar o mercado futuro de boi gordo da BM&F como ferramenta de redução de risco de sua produção, uma das primeiras perguntas a serem respondidas é: quanto se fazer de hedge? Esta pergunta tem sido frequentemente respondida através da utilização...

This research examines the lead-lag relationships between futures prices, prices from a cash forward market, and spot prices for two forest product markets. Results suggest that for 2x4 lumber, the forward market provides some level of price discovery, but futures play a dominant price discovery...

Cash forward contracting is a common, and often preferred, means of managing price risk for agribusinesses. Despite this, little is known about the performance of cash forward markets, in particular the role they play in price discovery. The lumber market provides a unique case for examining...