Katie Geerdes

The Commstock Report is a twice daily market report. 10/02/2026 Sour Tone Set for Harvest PLEASE REFER TO THE BROKER COMMENTARY PAGE FOR UPDATES!! Click Above to Watch Brian's Afternoon Market Update October is underway and grain traders have their focus on harvest progress picking up as the weather clears, but there is worth in one more look back at the September stocks report. With the report came answers to two important questions about whether last year's corn yield had been significantly overstated and whether old-crop soybean stocks were much tighter than previously predicted. USDA did not budge on the corn yield, but soybean inventories were recognized to be slimmer than most traders expected. The bearish reactions led by corn risked breaking the bullish price trends that had pushed corn futures above $5, soybeans above $13, and wheat above $7. Instead of offering a correction to an inflated corn yield estimate, the report was a reminder of abundant corn stocks being carried over as another large crop begins harvest. One silver lining within the inventory count was that a substantial proportion of corn stocks had shifted from on-farm to off-farm over the last quarter, suggesting that farmers had been selling more aggressively…

The Commstock Report is a twice daily market report. 10/01/2026 Why Wall Street Is Quietly Buying America's Best Farmland PLEASE REFER TO THE BROKER COMMENTARY PAGE FOR UPDATES!! Click Above to Watch Brian's Afternoon Market Update Are they now? That was the title from a podcast that caught my attention. It was a blanket statement that in reality fits more like a quilt. It began…" For most of American history, the value of farmland was dictated entirely by what you could grow out of it. But in late 2025, 35.5 acres of land in Sioux County, Iowa, sold at auction for $32,000 an acre. Hold that record-breaking price against the financial reality of the year it happened: corn and soybean prices were weak, profit margins were deeply compressed, and input costs for fertilizer and equipment were high. By every operational metric of what that ground could actually yield, it was a terrible time to buy land. A typical piece of cropland generates roughly $160 an acre in rent. Set against the multi-million-dollar capital cost required to buy premium dirt at the top of the market, that leaves a gross yield of roughly 1% before property taxes, management fees, or seed purchases. No…

The Commstock Report is a twice daily market report. 09/30/2026 The Argument for $6 Corn Just Got That Much Harder. PLEASE REFER TO THE BROKER COMMENTARY PAGE FOR UPDATES!! Click Above to Watch Brian's Afternoon Market Update Ouch!  We were expecting a quarterly stocks report with little fanfare, but USDA had other plans.  The corn market is down some 20 cents today as the Sept 1st quarterly stocks report saw the average estimate up some 177 million bushels over what the average trade guess was.  Some had speculated that last season's crop was overstated.  In actuality, it appears what was overstated was demand estimates.  Much of that appears to have come from a cut in feed usage, which we had previously stated was too high.  They just waited until now to tell us.  If we were to add this 177 million bushels to the last WASDE report, we would get an ending stock number for the 26/27 season of 1.744 billion bushels.  While tighter than last year, it makes the argument for $6 corn that much more difficult.  What we still don't know is how much of this can be offset in the October WASDE report.  The USDA would have to cut…

The Commstock Report is a twice daily market report. 09/29/2026 I Hate Russia More Than the President Does PLEASE REFER TO THE BROKER COMMENTARY PAGE FOR UPDATES!! Click Above to Watch Brian's Afternoon Market Update Russians are cruel people, a conclusion derived from observing their long history, the record of which applied to how they treat themselves besides others. They do not contest it with cruelty being almost a point of national pride. They are the ones that shoot their own soldiers to prevent them from retreating. Millions under Russian dominance were purposely starved to death and they also sent millions to Gulags in Siberia in order to rule the rest by fear. They used peasants as slaves long after slavery was ended by the rest of the world. When they had chances at democracy, after the fall of the Tsar and again after the breakup of the Soviet Union, they chose another repressor instead. Imagine how much wealth that the US has expended since WWII defending itself from Russia during the Cold War. Unlike Islamic extremists, they are not ideologues. They will kill, rape and pillage with the best of history’s barbarians but Russians will not strap explosives to their chest…

The Commstock Report is a twice daily market report. 09/28/2026 I am in Canada! PLEASE REFER TO THE BROKER COMMENTARY PAGE FOR UPDATES!! Click Above to Watch Brian's Afternoon Market Update Yeah…they let me in on my US passport. They have been nice to me so far. This time I came by sea as my forefathers did some 386 years ago. I used a similar route to theirs, traveling up the Saint Lawrence Seaway to Quebec City. My mother was a Demars which was the Americanized version of the French Demers. My distant grandfather came to Quebec from Dieppe France with 3 sons, one of which was our linage. They were reportedly part of a contingent of 800 French families who had their trip paid for and who were bequeathed property in Canada by the King to encourage the populating of New France. My distant grandfather got his 3 sons established in Quebec and then returned home to France which he and the rest of family then never left. Our 14-day cruise left from Boston with an itinerary of Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, Iles de la Madeleine, the Saguenay Fjord, Quebec City and then Portland Maine on the return. My forefathers…