It may be appropriate and relatively easy to distinguish between investors and speculators in financial markets. However, no matter how the terms are defined, it is impossible to separate them in commodity markets.
Historically speaking, investors have been thought of as pursuing a noble purpose – putting capital into a business or activity for profit and the common good. Conversely, there is a long history of speculators being portrayed as villains who reap “ill-gotten” gains at the expense of the poor and unfortunate. This distinction is carried forward in the language of modern politics. The Dodd-Frank financial legislation of 2010 was in part designed to punish those speculators blamed by politicians for causing the...
What You Need to Know Today: Commodities were mostly lower across the board today after yesterday’s Federal Reserve meeting hinted at a potential interest rate hike later in 2026. The dollar index reached its highest level in over a year, and a strong dollar makes U.S. agricultural expor...
Tomorrow is the Juneteenth federal holiday, and the USDA, along with the rest of the federal government and the CME, will be closed, so the monthly Cattle on Feed report was released a day early. The total number of cattle on feed in feedlots with 1,000 head or more capacity on 1 June amounted...
