Corn Futures and Investments

Corn is becoming the new soybean. With products such as ethanol, bio-diesel, corn plastics, corn sweetners and many more, corn is an investment worth looking into. Look into corn commodities and corn-based companies before the investment chances pass you by.

According to Bill Barnhart, of the Chicago Tribune, Commodity investing has been "in vogue" for the last four years. While Corn and Soy been had been on the same path, Corn has rallied since December, while soybean has slumped.
Talk about increasing ethanol use is giving the corn market hope, but there is still a big surplus to contend with. On April 10, 2006, the USDA trimmed it's U.S. 2005-2006 ending stocks estimate from 2.351 to 2.301 billion bushels. Production is expected to total 11.112 billion bushels with 10.935 billion bushels of total use. This puts the ending stocks to use ratio at 21%, the most in 13 years. On the world scene, the USDA is looking for the 2005-2006 ending stocks to drop from 130 to 129 million tons, or 19% of total use. In 2005-2006, exports are expected to increase 7% and so far, they are up 8% from a year ago. On March 31st, the USDA estimated that 78.0 million acres will be planted to corn this spring, down 4.6% from a year ago. As of April 16th, the USDA said that 9% of the corn crop was planted, down from 13% a year ago.
Use of corn as fuel is further justified. Ron Lamberty (executive director of the American Coalition for Ethanol) rejected the criticism that ethanol should be rethought because it has to be subsidized, saying that oil is also subsidized.
"We don't apologize for the fact that ethanol is taxed lower," Lamberty said. "We're not over in the Middle East because were trying to get Persian rugs. We've got a large Defense Department present in the Persian Gulf so we can bring fuel back at a low price."