A growing body of recent evidence suggests that premiums for financial options might be too high. For agricultural options, market participants often make similar claims, however there is very limited scientific literature to prove or disprove such claims. This research investigates the...

Using 1971-2000 data, we examine the accuracy of corn and soybean production forecasts provided by the USDA and two private agencies. All agencies improved their forecasts as the harvest progressed, and forecast errors were highly correlated and unbiased. The relative forecast accuracy of the...

Three attributes of futures contract behavior important for market performance—liquidity, volatility, and convergence—are investigated before and after the 2005 increase in speculative position limits for corn, soybean, and wheat contracts at the Chicago Board of Trade. The analysis of...

A growing body of recent evidence suggests that premiums for financial options might be too high. For agricultural options, market participants often make similar claims, however there is very limited scientific literature to prove or disprove such claims. This research investigates the...

The purpose of this paper is to determine whether smoothing in USDA corn and soybean production forecasts is concentrated in years with relatively small and large crops. The sample consists of all USDA corn and soybean production forecasts released over the 1970 through 2006 crop years. Results...

The purpose of this research report is to present an evaluation of advisory service pricing performance in 1997 for corn and soybeans. Specifically, the average price received by a subscriber to an advisory service is calculated for corn and soybean crops harvested in 1997. The average net...

We estimate the cost of post-harvest forward contracting corn and soybeans for January and March delivery from 1980 through 2009. For both corn and soybeans we saw a downward trend in the cost of forward contract for January delivery and we conclude that the cost of forward contracting for...

This study sought to determine whether monthly revisions of U.S. Department of Agriculture current-year corn and soybean yield forecasts are correlated and whether this correlation is associated with crop size. An ex-ante measure of crop size based on percent deviation of the current estimate...

Three attributes of futures contract behavior important for market performanceliquidity, volatility, and convergenceare investigated before and after the 2005 increase in speculative position limits for corn, soybean, and wheat contracts at the Chicago Board of Trade. The analysis of liquidity...

Using 1971-2000 data, we examine the accuracy of corn and soybean production forecasts provided by the USDA and two private agencies. All agencies improved their forecasts as the harvest progressed, and forecast errors were highly correlated and unbiased. The relative forecast accuracy of the...