USDA - Words Fail Me, Well Almost

The USDA are to revise their June 30th planting estimate for corn in the states of Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Missouri, North Dakota, Ohio and Pennsylvania, it has been revealed.

You may recall that the anticipated planting delays that caused a shift away from corn failed to show up in the June 30th report when the USDA shocked the trade by increasing their estimate to a shade over 87 million acres. That was a million acres higher than the highest trade estimate, and almost three million above the average trade guess.

It would appear that they are now concerned that they might have overstated things. So we are now left in limbo until they issue their revised wild stab in the dark on August 12th.

And surely if the corn number is wrong, doesn't that also mean that the soybean figure is too? But no, they aren't even looking at issuing a revised bean number.

It is bizarre, is it not, that we hang on their every word, eagerly await their every missive. In reality we might as well ask our Alzheimers-riddled Grandad sat stinking of wee and Uncle Joe's Mintballs on his commode in the corner what his opinion is on this year's corn acreage.

And of course the market will react according to the projections of an, at best, misguided bunch of old loons stumbling around in the dark using forty year old technology to guide us.

I wouldn't accept a lift up the road from them, let alone base a trading strategy around what they've got to say.