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WEEKLY COMMODITY HIGHLIGHTS

Nearby Futures	Weekly Change	Friday's Close	Year Ago
Corn	+0.07	3.70 1/4	3.83 3/4
Soybeans	-0.02 1/2	8.76 1/2	9.76 3/4
Wheat	+0.01 3/4	4.75 1/2	5.33 3/4
Cattle	+4.53	132.08	153.35
Hogs	+0.98	63.00	71.60
Cotton	+1.04	62.45	57.76
Milk	-0.06	13.72	16.01
Crude Oil	+1.80	32.19	46.31

It was a relatively quiet week in the ag trade as the grain complex was influenced by volatile outside markets in the absence of fresh fundamental news. Corn gained on the week amid short-covering, an uptick in export demand and a surge in crude oil late in the week. While domestic supplies remain abundant, a lack of farmer selling has helped underpin basis in some areas. Soybeans were down slightly on the week amid sideways, choppy trade. The weather forecast for Brazil and Argentina remains less than ideal, but still favor a very large soybean crop. Wheat was up slightly amid short-covering as the negative fundamentals in the market have been largely discounted. Cotton futures were steered by the gyrations in the stock market and crude oil, and climbed late in the week on support from those markets as well as strong weekly export sales. Rice futures recovered modestly after the prior week's fall, but could not sustain gains above the $11 area. Crude oil tumbled to another 12 1/2-year low early in the week but rebounded strongly Thursday and Friday on short-covering and speculative bottom-picking.

Live cattle futures surged as worries about the world economy and beef demand faded late in the week. Cash cattle trade on Friday was strong, however wholesale beef prices slipped, reaffirming that market has topped after a remarkable surge to start the year. Friday afternoon's Cattle on Feed report was also a little negative for prices, as it showed larger placements than most analysts were expecting. Lean hog futures also surged on the week, climbing to their highest levels in 12 to 13 weeks on strong cash prices and tightening supplies. Firm wholesale pork prices continue to underpin packer margins, which are robust.

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