Agricultures Futures

Reflecting on the agricultural future options markets as the stable road through the often times volatile world economy, this important guide provides a basic but functional treatment of futures/options in price risk management for agricultural commodities, fully supporting material with actual data analyses to demonstrate and illustrate concepts. Offers an integrated treatment of fundamental and technical analyses of the markets, and provides extensive treatment of fundamental demand/supply analysis with data-rich examples and illustrations. Presents full coverage of technical analysis, using actual charts and prices to demonstrate concepts, and discusses the bar chart as guides to management decisions. Emphasizes interest rate, stock index, and currency futures as important to the agribusiness and multinational firm, providing a detailed study of these dimensions and sources of risk. Now updates all data-driven illustrations and examples and offers extended content, coverage, and sophistication to treatment on options.

Today's Premier Guidebook for Understanding Agricultural Options and Making Them a Key Part of Your Trading and Risk Management Strategy Agricultural futures and options represent a vital niche in today's options trading world. Trading and Hedging with Agricultural Futures and Options takes an in-depth look at these valuable trading tools, and presents clear, proven strategies and techniques for both hedgers and traders to achieve their goals while minimizing risk. Relying on nuts-and-bolts techniques and examples as opposed to the mathematical models and theory favored by other options-trading manuals this practical, hands-on book discusses many topics, including: How hedgers and traders can use options effectively with realistic expectations Methods to understand price behavior including the "Greeks" (delta, gamma, vega, and theta) The importance of volatility and little-known ways to make it work to your advantage For producers and processors, agricultural futures and options are necessary components for controlling costs and hedging risks. For traders, they are proven vehicles for earning exceptional risk-adjusted profits. Whichever side of the aisle you are on, Trading and Hedging with Agricultural Futures and Options will provide you with the answers you need to effectively use these versatile tools and make them an integral part of your business.

Farming for Our Future examines the policies and legal reforms necessary to accelerate the adoption of practices that can make agriculture in the United States climate-neutral or better. These proven practices will also make our food system more resilient to the impacts of climate change. Agriculture's contribution to climate change is substantial--much more so than official figures suggest--and we will not be able to achieve our overall mitigation goals unless agricultural emissions sharply decline. Fortunately, farms and ranches can be a major part of the climate solution, while protecting biodiversity, strengthening rural communities, and improving the lives of the workers who cultivate our crops and rear our animals. The importance of agricultural climate solutions can not be underestimated; it is a critical element both in ensuring our food security and limiting climate change. This book provides essential solutions to address the greatest crises of our time.

Agricultural futures and options has been written for the potential and actual users of agricultural futures markets but should also provide a useful introduction to the more academic students of the subject. Divided into three parts, the first examines the North American markets with chapters on Chicago, definitions, hedgers, commodity trading advisors, options, New York and the Winnipeg community. Part 2's study of the European markets looks at soft commodities and the London Fox, the London Grain Futures Market, meat futures, potato futures and soya bean meal futures. Investing and investor protection is the subject of part 3. Guidelines are provided for opening and servicing an account and a further chapter deals with regulation.

Since the mid 2000s, an increasing financialization of commodity futures markets is taking place. This has fueled an ongoing discussion about the effect of financial investments on the development of commodity prices. Against this background, the trading activities of financial speculators also come to the fore. There is the concern that such speculators can cause irrational overshootings of agricultural commodity prices, e.g. in the event of global production shocks. In such an event the decrease of total supply induces a price surge menacing food security in developing countries. Yet, the question emerges whether speculation aggravates this price increase, eventually inducing a price bubble. The relevance of this concern is reinforced by the fact that due to climate change an increased frequency and severity of global agricultural production shortfalls is at stake. If speculation evokes an additional threat to food security in the event of a production shock, the political agenda should not be confined to focus solely on the adaptation to climate change. Instead, it is then also necessary to address speculative activities on agricultural commodity markets. This book scrutinises whether speculative bubbles can be identified in the event of severe global production shocks. For this, a framework for tracing the transmission of the futures price's development on the spot market is developed. Using annual data from 1979-2012 for maize it is analysed whether production shock related price bubbles occurred.

The recent introduction of agricultural options has created an exciting new opportunity to make spectacular profits at a low fixed risk. George Angell shows how to master these new instruments to earn maximum profits.