ValueInvestor

Bespoke's Commodity Snapshot (4/23/09)

These charts mean nothing.

The Outlook for Corn

Surprise, Surprise, the analysts were wrong.

"For corn, the average of all analysts' estimates is 11.982 billion bushels, according to Dow Jones Newswires, in a range of 11.880 billion to 12.078 billion. Only four of the fourteen analysts surveyed by Dow Jones see corn at or above 12 billion bushels."

Well seeing how the USDA report pegged corn at 12.101 billion bushels it seems that all 14 analysts were wrong.

Dow Jones-AIG Commodity Index Falls to Five-Year Low

Of course the DJ Commodity Index is down a tonne. All the Commodity Indexes are now so heavily weighted to energy prices they had nowhere to go except straight down. They're a useless index IMO because its essentially just an energy index. Someone that wants broad diversification in commodities can't get it with these.

The old Knight-Ridder CRB index was the best one around before Reuters-Jefferies got their hands on it and changed it into another energy index. It was 17 commodities EQUALLY weighted.