oats market graph

Drozd: Oat market hammers out a bottom

Bottoming action is evident in the December 2015 oat futures market

A hammer materialized on the December oat futures chart on Monday, April 27, 2015. Hammers are reversal patterns that appear at market bottoms on candlestick charts and are bullish, as they are said to be “hammering out a bottom.” The hammer represents a period in the market where an intraday sell-off is met with strong

soybean futures pricing chart

Drozd: Soybean market falls to a new low

The November futures contract is stuck in a downward trend

The soybean market has been under considerable pressure. The weakness started after a head-and-shoulders top developed on June 30, 2014. This classic reversal pattern was featured in my August 2014 column and I’ve also illustrated it in the accompanying chart. What a difference a year makes! The daily soybean futures contracts are trading at new


canola trend price chart

Canola rallies to eight-month high

Market Outlook: Longs move back in when the market bottoms for a second time

Canola has rallied $65 per tonne since Dec. 4, 2014, the day the May 2015 futures contract turned up from a second low at $408.60. A chart pattern known as a double bottom indicated the May futures contract would rally to $470 per tonne, a level not seen since June 30, 2014. Double bottom Double

Canadian dollar monthly nearby: Chart as of Dec. 12, 2014.

Canadian dollar continues to trend lower, slipping to a 5-1/2-year low

A lower Canadian dollar makes our exports more competitive but it increases the cost of imports

The Canadian dollar has been trending lower for the past three years. As recently as December 2012, it was trading at par to the U.S. dollar. Last year at this time it was worth 94 cents to the U.S. dollar and this year it is down to 86 cents. Canada is a resource-based country and

Mike Jubinville

Canola prices entering sideways trend

The old highs have become the new lows

Canola prices are tracking the overall trend towards lower commodity prices this year, but there is still room for some comfortable margins, a prominent market analyst says. Speaking at Farm Credit Canada’s Ag Outlook 2015 in Winnipeg, Mike Jubinville of ProFarmer Canada said that while the canola markets aren’t good, they’re not really bad either.


Crude oil monthly nearby: Chart as of Nov. 27, 2014.

Crude oil falls to a four-year low

Plunging prices are casting a dark shadow across the commodity sector

At the time of this writing, crude oil has plunged $40 per barrel, losing 37 per cent of its value, since prices turned down from $107.73 in June 2014. This market’s steady decline may have come as a surprise to some followers of oil, but for those who study charting and technical analysis, they were





What was once pasture for cattle is now home to a flock of pelicans at East Shoal Lake.  photo: shannon vanraes

Shoal Lake: Flooded landowners slam province’s buyout tactics

Shoal Lakes farmers say they weren’t allowed to examine or make 
a copy of their assessment and pressured to take it or leave it

The paperwork is spread across the kitchen of the new home Brian McCulley purchased after flooding forced him off his land near the shore of West Shoal Lake — including a scorned buyout offer from the province. “It wasn’t fair market value and I didn’t consider what was on that piece of paper to be