Soybeans fell back below the psychologically significant $13.00 level as January options expiration looms.
TRANSCRIPT
Mr. Oliver Slope, he’s with Blue Line Futures in Chicago. Oliver, thanks for coming on. I know it’s a slow day, so there’s no pressure. The floor is yours, you can do whatever you want. The floor is yours, but any good info that you can give the viewers before we kind of depart for today?
Well, yeah, you’re seeing beans continue to bleed lower, and this has really been a trend here over the last couple of weeks, despite the ongoing weather concerns in South America. I think some of the weakness that we’re seeing today might be kind of end of the year positioning. On top of that, we do have January options expiration tomorrow that expire after the close. And that January contract, it looks like it wants to be penned right near that $13 level. So I wouldn’t be surprised to see that happen, but I think ultimately we see value down here, and we haven’t seen value in beans for some time, but I think we’re getting a little bit overextended, and these concerns in South America are continuing to mount. But we might not get that money flow back into the markets until we turn the calendar over and get a little bit more participation going forward. So I like beans here, but they’ve got to hold some of these levels because if we do break and close below some of these support pockets, there is some air below the market back to those October lows. So with January options expiration tomorrow, the focus really is on the March futures. 13 to 13.10 has got to hold. A break and close below there opens the floodgates to those October lows, 12.82. Again, optimistic, but need to see these levels hold to round out the week. It’s just, when we’re just this slow, and it feels like that with both Cornell beans, you know, we just keep chipping away to the downside, and it’s almost like one of those days where you, I’ve seen it before, where you feel like we might get capitulation, and all of a sudden everybody comes and runs on the door and want to get out at the same time. And that’s what I think it just smells like a little bit to me. Right, you’re getting the slow bleed lower, and it’s just kind of bleeding out. You really want to see that peak panic to feel good about marking at least a short-term low. Right. And that capitulation, and then where buyers are just ready, willing, and able to step in. And we just, it’s been a buyer strike for the most part. Right, all right. Stay right there. We need to go away. We’re going to pay some bills. We’re going to come back and talk more with Oliver Slope, Blue Line Futures in Chicago. We’ll be right back after this. Let’s bring back Mr. Oliver Slope from Blue Line Futures to see if he’s got anything really important to tell us about the livestock. No, just cattle giving back some gains from yesterday. All in all, I think the chart still remains pretty darn constructive. We are attempting to carve out higher highs and higher lows, but we need to see support hold to do that for February live cattle. That’s 168 and a half. We’re kind of waiting on cash to develop a little bit more, but we might not get that until tomorrow. We do have a cattle on feed report after the close, cold storage report, and then a hogs and pigs report. So despite us kind of leaning into a holiday trade here, there still is a lot of data after the close. It’s going to be interesting to see what that comes out as, but more importantly, I think, is the market even going to recall what those reports said when we come back Tuesday morning? Yeah, it’s one of those difficult ones where they have it on right before we’re gone. And just like everything else, it’s a hard open, but we’ll see. I also wanted to ask you real quick, do you have any expectations for what might happen with Prop 12 going into effect? You know, that’s going to be something we’re going to keep a close eye on going forward. I know that there’s been a lot of jawboning back and forth on what is going to transpire with that, and we’ve seen the hog market respond with some volatility. But mostly, sharply sideways here is, I think, a lot of market participants and money managers are just kind of in a wait-and-see pattern at the moment. All right, great stuff, as usual. Thank you very much. Have a Merry Christmas. Oliver Slope from Lulon Futures in Chicago. We’ll bring it back here to Suzanne. We can say, hope you have a great time. Well, we’re going to be back here tomorrow. We’re back here tomorrow. Yeah, don’t push it.