Katie Geerdes

The Commstock Report is a twice daily market report. 08/24/2026 The Canadian/US Boundary Hardens PLEASE REFER TO THE BROKER COMMENTARY PAGE FOR UPDATES!! Click Above to Watch Brian's Afternoon Market Update Trade negotiations forced by punitive tariffs imposed by the US on Canada failed to reach a resolution over the weekend. "Prime Minister Mark Carney of Canada said he had decided to suspend the talks because the American side had introduced last-minute terms that were "unfair, uneconomic, and called into question the reliability of any deal." Canada will reciprocate with tariffs and Trump will pound back and we will all live unhappily thereafter. Carney also asserted, "Last Spring, I warned that America is trying to break us so they can own us and I promised that that will never, ever happen. The U.S. that proposed new terms that were "unfair," compromised Canada's sovereignty and revealed the limits of U.S. "commitments to a true economic partnership." Actually, that sounds about right. The "new terms" alluded to, referred to a snapback provision the US demanded allowing the US to reimpose the 50% tariffs on a whim. The US invoked Article 5 of NATO for the first and only time in its history after the September…

The Commstock Report is a twice daily market report. 08/24/2026 Sell the Grain Price Strength, Buy the Livestock Break? PLEASE REFER TO THE BROKER COMMENTARY PAGE FOR UPDATES!! Click Above to Watch Brian's Afternoon Market Update Bearish divergence at key price levels: The jury is still out on whether grain futures are in the process of breaking out or forming a top. There were signs of bearish divergence in the grains before Wednesday this week, when news about the Treasury Department's bond repurchasing plans sent money flowing into commodities. Corn's push to new highs was backed by considerable volume, but the question of new buying versus short covering remains. It also remains to be seen whether speculative profit-taking coincides with substantial farmer selling interest as grain futures trade around the psychologically important levels of corn at $5, soybeans at $12.50, and Chicago wheat at $7. Fund positioning becoming stretched: Managed money may have posted a record week of buying corn futures, likely bringing their net-long from 166,000 to more than 300,000 contracts after the reporting period that started with last week's bullish crop report reaction. That position will still be short of the record net-long of 429,000 contracts, but large enough to…

The Commstock Report is a twice daily market report. 08/20/2026 We are Cool…Right? PLEASE REFER TO THE BROKER COMMENTARY PAGE FOR UPDATES!! Click Above to Watch Brian's Afternoon Market Update The question was associated with a meme on Truth Social posted by the President with the question directed coming from Kim Jung Un. I don't subscribe to Truth Social but the more outlandish memes posted there get around which is what he intended. To me his memes remind me of Mad Magazine which subscribers of my generation could relate to. The magazine began the year that I was born, 1952 and saw it heyday in the 1970's. Topics that used to be Mad Magazine material are pretty common stuff today. Is there a historical ally that our president has not offended yet in some way? Give him time. Long-term relationships and security commitments have been tossed out like a game of pick-um-up sticks where we hardly know where to start now to reorganize the US place in the stack of the world. Despite his meme, the president bristled at being later questioned about it. For reference, Kim Jung Un is our enemy. So is Putin. Kim is sending another 30,000 NK troops…

The Commstock Report is a twice daily market report. 08/19/2026 Corn Versus Cows-South Dakota’s Great Mistake PLEASE REFER TO THE BROKER COMMENTARY PAGE FOR UPDATES!! Click Above to Watch Brian's Afternoon Market Update We expect "the market" to fix low prices but sometimes low prices are created by "the market" too. I think South Dakota is a real-life example of how market signals can get short-circuited. Today we have a cow-shortage and a corn-surplus in the US and South Dakota is part of the reason why. Over recent years a lot of acres in South Dakota that used to be ranchland with cows is now growing corn instead. $7 corn proved to be an illusion (bait) that brought marginal acres into corn production but now they are tied up and will not easily be converted back. As you travel east to west across the state, fewer South Dakota corn growers have the soil type to grow corn profitably so are consistently losing money as marginal producers kept in business by crop insurance and USDA ACHs. Ranchers there however, are highly profitable. South Dakotans also made the mistake of rejecting CO2 pipelines which would add demand to the corn market by reducing the…

The Commstock Report is a twice daily market report. 08/18/2026 History Favors Additional Yield Cuts….But??? PLEASE REFER TO THE BROKER COMMENTARY PAGE FOR UPDATES!! Click Above to Watch Brian's Afternoon Market Update I have always noticed how the general market sentiment is that August weather means very little to corn production as it is predominately "made" in the month of July. I have never understood that. To be clear, July weather has an oversized impact on yields, but the trade often acts like the crop has already been harvested and is in the bin. August weather can easily have 30+ bpa impact on final yields as both temperature and rainfall help the fill. Look no further than last year where yields were headed for 188.8+ bpa at the start of August, only to go through terrible conditions the second half of August. USDA was forced to backtrack, dropping yields 2.3 bpa by January due to disease and drought. Last week we pointed out that history favors the USDA decreasing yields between August and January. To be more precise, in the last ten years, the USDA decreased yields in seven out of the last ten years between August to January. So while chance favors a…

The Commstock Report is a twice daily market report. 08/17/2026 Like I Wrote…Too Hot-Too Long PLEASE REFER TO THE BROKER COMMENTARY PAGE FOR UPDATES!! Click Above to Watch Brian's Afternoon Market Update Our Kansas staff tells us that the state is toast. A stress degree day is added to the total when high temps surpass 86^. 140 or higher accumulated SDDs impairs the yield potential so that a trendline yield becomes aspirational. The accumulated SDDs for Kansas would confirm their bleak assessment. This is the worst of the worst. Anything not under a running center pivot is not green. Nebraska and the Dakotas are similar but with regions in them that escaped, while nowhere in Kansas did. They are now hoping that it will rain to put some moisture in the soil for planting winter wheat soon. Iowa planted twice as many acres to corn as did Kansas and was the USDA’s top state corn yield projecting 216 bpa compared to 210 bpa in 2025. Most corn production in Iowa is in the northern 2/3rds of the state and there is a rare station that is reporting SDDs above 140. It would appear that Iowa survived the heat. I have no problem…

The Commstock Report is a twice daily market report. 08/12/2026 Bullish Yield Offsets Another Bearish Acreage Surprise PLEASE REFER TO THE BROKER COMMENTARY PAGE FOR UPDATES!! Click Above to Watch Brian's Afternoon Market Update Finally, the August crop report is behind us. Most traders would have given first glance to corn yield, which was evidently weighted heavier in the algorithmic systems, since the bullish report reaction was attributed to the estimate coming in at 180.7 bushels per acre versus an average trade guess of 182.4. But looking up one line on the balance sheet showed a much larger than expected harvested acreage estimate. Here we go again. Harvested corn acres were increased by 1.2 million on plantings that rose to 96.7 million. It was similar with soybeans, with yield at 52.7 lower than the average trade guess but with acreage climbing by 1.4 million. The acreage changes were overpowered in the reaction but not ignored, as they likely helped contribute to the relatively weaker effect for soybean prices. Part of the reasoning for putting more focus on corn yield would be the idea of those extra acres not making it to grain anyway. The acreage adjustments will stoke further frustration after last…

The Commstock Report is a twice daily market report. 08/11/2026 Yield Estimates Fall Towards Trendline – Long Term View Positive PLEASE REFER TO THE BROKER COMMENTARY PAGE FOR UPDATES!! Click Above to Watch Brian's Afternoon Market Update Tomorrow's report will undoubtedly have a major impact on markets in the short-term, but even if it is bearish, we don't see it changing our longer-term bullish forecast. Last year caught the market by surprise by printing the largest yield forecast ever recorded, sending prices sharply lower. We didn't know it then, but that was ultimately a buying opportunity. Analysts like to remind us that lows have been made in the month of August in 8 out of the last 10 years. So far this year, it appears to be repeating the same pattern. My only problem with this is it tends to create recency bias, whereas because it has always happened a certain way, everyone continues to assume it will continue to do so. Sooner or later, we are given a surprise, reminding us that is not always the case. The market consensus seems to be that above trend line yields are out of the question. The crop has way too many holes in…

The Commstock Report is a twice daily market report. 08/10/2026 Probably My Last Trip to the Farms in Brasil PLEASE REFER TO THE BROKER COMMENTARY PAGE FOR UPDATES!! Click Above to Watch Brian's Afternoon Market Update 'Spell-Check' thinks Brasil is spelled with a Z (Brazil). Down there they spell it with an S (Brasil). I have been to Brasil close to 35 times, mostly for investment duties, since December of 2001. That was just a month after 9-11 when the world changed.  I went because I wanted to get a first-hand view of our rising Ag competitor. I learned that US farmers really do not have a good perspective of where they fit into the global Ag structure until they have seen Brasil's Ag. Home looks different after you have been there. This trip was for the Kruse-Schutte family reunion. The relationship between our families began back in 1996 when my son Matthew joined a high school student exchange (GAPP) program where, by chance, he was hosted by the Schutte family in Dresden Germany. We then hosted both Schuette sons, Tino and Marco, to internships here in the US and Matthew returned to Dresden during college for a summer internship, staying with the Schutte's,…

The Commstock Report is a twice daily market report. 08/07/2026 Long Straddle or Short Strangle PLEASE REFER TO THE BROKER COMMENTARY PAGE FOR UPDATES!! Click Above to Watch Brian's Afternoon Market Update CME Group described Thursday's market with the newsletter title "Low Volatility Ahead of Data Day." Financial market volatility was particularly subdued as stock index futures hovered just under new record highs from the previous session. The reference to Data Day centered on the Friday morning jobs report, which did inject a moderate dose of volatility into markets because of employment contracting rather than growing as expected. It was 'bad news is good news' for interest rate expectations, which is why lower bond yields were initially accompanied by a softer dollar and stronger stock futures. Silver and gold jumped immediately to extend overnight gains, but the metals and most markets quickly settled and reverted as traders weighed concerns about the bad news on jobs still being bad for the economy. Consider whether the potential for growing uncertainty about monetary policy and the economy may fuel heightened market volatility in the weeks ahead, not only for the stock market but also for commodities including grains and livestock. For the stock market, monitor…