Hedge fund continues to push for Agrium breakup

Reuters / Hedge fund Jana Partners LLC, the largest shareholder in Agrium Inc., is calling for the company to be more open to discussing ways to boost shareholder value. Jana, which has been pushing for a split of the Canadian fertilizer company’s wholesale and retail division, says Agrium’s responses to the issues it has raised

Feast and famine for Africa farm investment

African agriculture has a big investment problem: lots of private equity interest but few opportunities because most farms and companies are too small to absorb the cash or provide attractive returns. With only a third of its 630 million hectares of arable land under cultivation and large quantities of water flowing untapped, Africa is the


Classic topping action in soybean meal

Each day’s prices and the pattern configurations are a direct result of human decisions to buy and sell

Technical analysis is the study of market movement. Its strength and popularity comes from the assumption that future price direction can be predicted by studying a market’s past activity. Technical analysis is concerned exclusively with the market and certain statistics the market generates — prices, volume and open interest. In technical analysis, no consideration is

Local investment can pay off

Canadians may not have to face some of the dangers others in the world are dealing with directly, but there’s still good reason to be nervous. After all, Bernie Madoff drained the accounts of his Canadian holders — including some of our most prominent institutions. If the shenanigans at Jon Corzine’s MF Global or at


Futures industry shaken as another broker goes bankrupt

Reuters / Russell Wasendorf Sr., arrested last Friday, confessed to a 20-year fraud at Peregrine Financial Group (PFG), his now-bankrupt Iowa brokerage, saying business troubles and his “big” ego left him no choice: “So I cheated.” In the dramatic conclusion to a week-long saga that has shaken trader confidence in the trillion-dollar U.S. futures markets,

CBOT, grain traders face off in court

chicago / reuters / CME Group faced off with a group of traders in Federal Court June 26 over new rules for settling end-of-day grain prices that the traders fear will put them out of business. The traders, who work in the open-outcry pits at CME’s Chicago Board of Trade, are fighting to preserve a


Spring wheat posts its highest price of open-market era

Watch for rising wedges in bear markets and falling wedges in bull markets, where they are most apt to occur

Red spring wheat grading No. 1 13.5 per cent protein reached $8 per bushel for the 2012-13 crop year. This is the highest price farmers have been able to lock in, since the open-market era was announced in mid-December 2011. True to form, wheat prices began their seasonal turn higher, just as the U.S. winter

New player in deregulated market

A Southeast Asian agri-food processor and a U.S. commodity trading firm are pairing up to enter the deregulated Prairie grain and oilseed supply chain. Singapore-based Olam International and Kansas City’s Lansing Trade Group have announced a new 50-50 joint venture, Lansing Olam Canada, to “originate and merchandise Canadian grains and oilseeds.” The two companies said


A classic head and shoulders confirmed downturn

To those less familiar with charting and technical analysis, the recent drop in oat prices may have come as a bit of a surprise. What I have found in my 30 years’ experience, is that even though the oat futures market has a relatively small amount of open interest compared to actively traded commodities such

Viterra shareholders back Glencore

Reuters / Shareholders of Canada’s largest grain handler, Viterra Inc., voted overwhelmingly May 29 in favour of a friendly takeover bid by Swiss commodities trader Glencore International Plc., pushing the biggest deal in years for the global agricultural sector closer to reality. The deal was supported by 99.8 per cent of shareholders, far more than