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This paper investigates the effect of algorithmic trading activity, as measured by quoting, on the corn, soybean, and live cattle commodity futures market quality. Using the CME’s limit-order-book ...

The paper pioneers research on high frequency (HF) quoting noise in electronically traded agricultural futures markets. HF quoting – quickly cancelling posted limit orders and replacing them with n...

This article investigates market reactions to major United States Department of Agriculture announcements during non-trading and trading hours in the soybean futures market using microstructure dat...

Using individual trader data from the Commodity Futures Trading Commission's (CFTC) Large Trader Reporting System (LTRS) for the period January 2000 to September 2009, this article investigates whether noncommercial traders in the corn, live cattle and coffee futures markets persist in making profits. Two out-of-sample measures of skill – a winner and a loser ranking test and a top and a bottom decile test – are used to analyse the ability of traders to consistently perform well at monthly, quarterly and annual time horizons. The findings identify significant persistence in rankings – traders in the top half of the profit distribution in a time period tend to stay in the top half in the next period. Differences in magnitude of profitability between the top and bottom deciles also provide support that persistent skill exists among the top 10% of traders. Detailed examination of annual rankings for those traders who were most continuously in the markets further reveals persistence in profits for a smaller s...

Research has provided mixed results regarding the presence of a time-varying risk premium in agricultural futures markets. In this article we test for the presence of a time-varying risk premium focusing on the properties of the underlying data. Our results show that accounting for the structural break in the 1970s plays a key role in the findings. In contrast to recent research, we find only limited evidence of time-varying risk premium. For a two-month horizon the corn, soybean meal and hog markets show no signs of a risk premium, while very weak support for a time-varying premium emerges in live cattle. For the four-month horizon, no evidence of a time-varying risk premium appears for any of the markets.

The reported analysis examines a simultaneous estimation option-based approach to forecast futures prices in the presence of daily price limit moves. The procedure explicitly allows for changing implied volatilities by estimating the implied futures price and the implied volatility simultaneously. Using futures and futures options data for three agricultural commodities, it is found that the simultaneous estimation approach accounts for the abrupt changes in implied volatility associated with limit moves and generates more accurate price forecasts than conventional methods that rely on only one implied variable.

Time-varying hedge ratios are derived which account for the dynamic characteristics of prices in the soybean complex. A multivariate generalized autogressive heteroskedastic (MGARCH) model, along with other conditional models, is used to specify the relevant covariance matrix. While the time-varying representations of the variance matrix are statistically appropriateex anteand ex posthedging effectiveness indicate that they provide minimal gain to hedging in terms of mean return and reduction in variance over a constant conditional procedure. Whether similar findings arise from other applications of GARCH models to optimal hedging is a question for further research.

The presence of co-integration between interest rates and inflation implies the existence of an error-correction model and the possibility of two sources of causation. Causality testing which does not account for feedback through the error-correction mechanism as well as through the error-correction mechanism as well as through the lagged changes in the variables can produce misleading reuslts. Reinterpreting Atkin' error-correction model and causality tests in this framework points to a feedback relationship between inflation and post-tax nominal interest rates. These findings are consistent with previously published results but are in contrast to Atkinsapos; conclusion of one-way causality from inflation to interest rates.

The pricing efficiency of the live hog futures market is examined utilizing both necessary and sufficient conditions. Out-of-sample forecasts from an econometric model, an ARIMA model and a composite forecasting model are compared with the forward prices of the futures market within a mean squared error framework. At least one model, and frequently all of them, forecast more accurately than the futures market, a necessary condition for market efficiency. The sufficient condition is assessed using simulated market trading strategies based o,n the most accurate model forecasts. Results suggest that informational inefficiencies exist in the live hog futures market.