(Some) Commodities Are a Buy

I’m a commodity trader…but that doesn’t mean I always expect commodity prices to go UP. In fact, a lot of times you’ve got to bet AGAINST commodities if you want to make a buck. But that’s not the situation today. Most commodities are in a bull market…and it’s not to late to profit from it.

Lately, the stock market has been grabbing most of the headlines for its surprisingly strong performance since last March. But commodity prices have been surging as well. Favorable macro-economic trends are powering both markets.

The S&P 500 Index is up more than 50% from its March lows. Meanwhile, the CRB Index of commodity prices recently broke above the 280 level making new yearly highs – about a 40% advance from the lows of last year.

Therefore, no matter what America’s grim economic data may be saying, the stock market and the commodity markets both agree that some sort of recovery is underway.

I how no opinion about where stock prices are headed next, but I feel fairly confident that commodity prices will continue trending higher over the coming years. That said, many commodity markets have already posted such large gains during the last few months that some investors may be skittish about climbing aboard.

I understand this fear, but investors must remember that commodities are not homogenous. Even though many of them have soared this year, some commodities have advanced very little. Corn is one of the notable laggards…and I think it has some catching up to do.

My recent research travels took me to the West Coast to revisit acquaintances made during the July National Chicken Marketing convention. (Yeah, that’s what I do for fun!)

My big takeaway from this chicken confab was that most of the presenters and professionals in attendance believed that $3.00 corn was way too cheap and that corn prices would begin moving higher. I trust these guys. After all, it’s their business to know the cost inputs from the egg to the bird on your plate. But their bullish outlook for corn was a minority opinion at the time.

Back in mid-summer, when this convention took place, the corn crop looked likely to make it through the summer months in great shape, with no threats in sight to disrupt high yields. Consequently, corn prices were languishing near multi-year lows.

But as it turns out, the “chicken crowd” was right to believe that corn prices were too cheap. And the corn price charts from last summer confirmed the strong potential for even higher prices. Though my view on trading weighs heavily on technical analysis, I learned long ago not to ignore important fundamental information. At the lowly price of $3.00 a bushel, the upside potential for corn seemed much greater than the downside risk.

That’s why I urged the subscribers of my Resource Trader Alert (RTA) to enter a bullish trade on corn. Over at RTA we use options to directly play commodities themselves — options help limit our risks, while still providing ample opportunity to profit.

I recommended a six-month-long option play on corn, designed to benefit from any strong up-move in corn prices. The specific trade I recommended cost just a little more than $1,100 to initiate. I was looking for corn to move to $4.00 a bushel by then end of this year. But as it turned out, we hit that target in late October, which caused the value of the corn trade I recommended to more than double.

That’s just how quickly the commodity options can move – a 25% rally in corn prices caused the recommended corn options to double. By using options we were able to maximize our profit potential and substantially limit our risk.

The reality of fundamental trading on things like weather, planting intentions, yields, exports or crop disease is that the information does not flow freely to everyone at the same time. The farmers, seed salesmen and grain elevator operators use their legal inside information in the market before others. Often, price charts reflect this “insider knowledge.”

In other words, a price chart can provide an early indication that a market is about move into a bullish mode, even before any broadly disseminated public information would confirm the rising prices. Therefore, when you combine technical analysis with the informed insights of industry insiders, you can shift the odds of success greatly in your favor.

After a brief correction, corn is on the rise again and trading just above $4.00 a bushel. I’m staying with this friendly trend for now.

Regards,

Alan Knuckman,
for The Daily Reckoning