Cogdill Farm Supply, Inc.

2024 Spring Seasonal Grain Marketing Update - 4/10/24

With planting season now upon us, if you haven’t already done so, it’s time to have a plan to market grain over the next 60-90 days. Your plan doesn’t have to be complicated, but it’s important to have some firm prices, dates, and quantities decided so you can take action. How much new- and old-crop grain do you want to have priced? By what date do you want to have that done? At what price level will you start pricing? A simple marketing plan might be something like the following:
“I will use target orders to sell 15,000 bushels of new-crop cash corn by July 3^rd. My first target will be 5,000 bushels at $4.74 for May 2025 delivery. If the target is not filled by May 20^th, I will sell 5,000 bushels for May’25 delivery at the posted bid, and adjust the price on the target order as needed. If the target is filled, I will enter a new target order to sell another 5,000 bushels at $4.95 for May 2025 delivery. I will re-evaluate again on June 10^th. If the May’25 price hits $5.15, I will sell the balance of the bushels. Any portion of the 15,000 bushels still unsold on July 3^rd will be sold at the posted bid.”

Is that a perfect plan? No. I can think of plenty of ways a person might need to adjust that plan to work for their situation. Will it get the job done? If the job is to get grain sold with the seasonals, then yes, it will get the job done. A much simpler plan would be to put 15,000 bushels into a seasonal average price program and let it ride while you’re busy farming. Unfortunately, there’s no way to know in advance what will be the best marketing plan. What we do know, however, is that not having any plan usually leads to poor results.

Averaging Contracts are a great way to ensure you get bushels priced during the growing season when the best prices typically occur. Averaging contracts are very simple: you decide how many bushels you want to sell, and when the pricing period will begin and end. At the end of the pricing period, you receive the daily average closing price from the pricing period.

Cogdill Farm Supply’s 2024 Average Price Program group runs from April 22^nd – July 12^th.
Sell any desired quantity of corn or soybeans of at least 1,000 bushels.
No fees for average price contracts if basis is set by the end of the pricing period.
Averaging can be stopped early, and all remaining bushels priced with no penalty.
5-cent per bushel HTA fee for 2024 average price to Hedge-to-Arrive contracts.
Customized pricing and delivery periods are available (i.e. old-crop or new-crop)
Guaranteed price floor price protection is available for a fee.
2025 contracts are available; fees will vary depending on delivery period.
3-Cent flex delivery fee for direct ship delivery to a 3^rd party buyer
Contact your local Cogdill Farm Supply location to enroll bushels, or call Rob @ 712-269-5849

Set Some Reasonable Targets. The graph below shows the path of corn prices since last July through April 9^th, with five lines going forward from April 9^th illustrating the likely range where we can expect prices will go over the next 6 months. You can think of the lines as sort of like the probability of rain in a weather forecast. For example, based on the previous 30 years of history, we should expect there’s a 15% chance that on June 20^th DEC corn will be higher than $5.15, a 15% chance the price will be lower than $4.15, and about a 50/50 shot that the price will be about the same as today. I like to look at the market in this way when I’m deciding on price targets for sales. The chart tells us what we should already know: usually corn prices don’t get better after June 20^th, and it will take an extreme event this year to see cash prices over $5.00.