Wednesday, October 12, 2011

Agriculture Stocks Jumped Ahead of Today's USDA Crop Reports (CF; MOS; DE)

The Dow Jones empire had pretty good timing with Saturday's "Barron's Loves the Ag Companies: "Prepare for a Bountiful Harvest" (ADM; BG; MON; DE)" which we linked to on Tuesday and which somehow disappeared into the ether before being recovered this morning.
A good piece.
On yesterday's action here's MarketWatch:

CF Industries Holdings, Mosaic among top S&P 500 gainers
 Agriculture stocks jumped on a broad rally in grain futures Tuesday, ahead of key crop reports from the U.S. Department of Agriculture on Wednesday morning.
December corn  closed Tuesday’s session at its daily price move limit, up 40 cents, or 6.6%, at $6.45 a bushel on the Chicago Board of Trade. November soybeans settled up 58 cents, or 4.9%, to $12.36 a bushel while December wheat added 49 cents, or 8.1%, to close at $6.61 a bushel.
Credit Suisse Group AG also raised its fertilizer price outlook in a research note Tuesday, citing robust grain prices, tight supply and strong demand from emerging markets. 

Fertilizer companies were some of the top gainers in the S&P 500 on Tuesday. Shares of CF Industries Holdings Inc. CF +1.08%   picked up 4.6%, with shares of Mosaic Co. MOS +4.28%   adding 4.3%. Shares of agricultural machinery manufacturer Deere & Co. DE +1.16%  rose 3.3%. 

The grain futures rally also lifted Canadian agriculture companies. Toronto-listed shares of Potash Corp. of Saskatchewan CA:POT +6.66%   POT +2.14%  , the world’s largest fertilizer producer, soared 6.7% while shares of fellow fertilizer maker Agrium Inc. CA:AGU +6.80%   AGU +1.18%  jumped 6.8%.
The USDA Crop Production and World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates (WASDE) reports are issued every month and provide U.S. and global crop forecasts. 

The report on crop production is expected to show a lower forecast for U.S. corn production, with estimates from futures brokerage PFGBEST pointing to a decline to 12.395 billion bushels from the 12.5 billion in September’s USDA forecast.
U.S. corn ending stock forecasts in the WASDE report are expected to rise to 730 million bushels, up from September’s estimate of 672 million bushels...MORE.
See also: last Friday's "Today in Fertilizer: Which Of the Stocks are Tradable? (AGU; CF; MON; MON; POT)"