Get ready for 22-hour trade!
May 04, 2012
Chip Flory
From The Editor
May 3, 2012
Hello Pro Farmer Members!
What a week! But, 1:15 on Friday has come and gone so we can take a deep breath and wrap things up for the week. It's a good feeling. Unfortunately, it's a feeling we'll only get to enjoy two more times. That's because starting May 20 grain trade will start at 5:00 p.m. CT on Sunday afternoon and will continue with just minor interruptions until 4:00 p.m. on Fridays. Make sure you read News page 4 of Pro Farmer this week. It gives you some of the potential impacts of how the expanded trade will be handled. To make it clear, grain trade will start at 5:00 p.m. on Sundays only. That session will continue until 4:00 p.m. on Monday, then the market will close for two hours and restart at 6:00 p.m. Monday thru Thursday evenings.
If USDA sticks with the current report release schedule, that means critical reports (like Quarterly Grain Stocks, Monthly Supply & Demand Reports, Monthly Crop Production Reports, Weekly Export Sales Reports and daily export sales announcements) will be released while the markets are open.
We're kicking around some ideas about how to handle these reports and sent a survey to some users of Pro Farmer's daily service (Pro Farmer Today) about how they'd like to see us handle coverage of these reports. One idea: We are considering providing “live streaming” of major USDA Reports at www.profarmer.com. We would begin “broadcasting” at about 7:25 a.m. CT ahead of USDA’s 7:30 a.m. CT releases of major reports. In the broadcast, we would announce details and add our perspective as the report details are “flashed” on newswires. If you’d like, you’d be able to continue to watch while Pro Farmer editors dig deeper into the details of these reports for added perspective.
What do you think? Would you watch live analysis of USDA reports? Leave us a comment below and we'll include your responses in our survey. Thanks!
That's it for now...
... have a great weekend.
