In the past trading week, I traded these contracts:

I shorted on soybean because I read articles about Soybean futures trading levels going down as well as cash market deliveries decreasing. By the positive profits I’ve made, I made the right prediction last week. In addition, on this Friday, a new release has shown that the actual harvest level is much more than estimated, which decreased soybean price further more: “For soybeans, the yield estimate was raised, but by a 0.8 bushels per acre to 37.8 bushels per acre, adding an extra 65m bushels to the crop.” However, the fact that March soybean price decreased while December soybean price raised confused me.

I went long on Corn to reduce the risk of shorting on Soybean, for we learned from Jim’s class that these two commodities’ prices are of 60% possibility positively related. And it turned out a release came out that corn harvest level were smaller that estimated. However, as timing matters, the two contracts I made has opposite signs of profits.

References:

1.http://futures.tradingcharts.com/news/futures/DJ_U_S__SOY__Beans_Ease_on_Profit_Taking__Export_Sales_Disappoint_187726008.html

2.http://www.agrimoney.com/news/grain-soybean-prices-dip-despite-informa-data–5172.html