12/18/06 Choppy wheat futures trade expected

Marketline December 18, 2006 After being down much of the day Friday wheat futures moved up and closed mostly higher. Fund buying and wheat/corn spreading provided support. Traders are said to be anxious to see the export sales report later this week to find out if recent price lows attracted new buying interest. Peter Georgantones of Investment Trading Services in Bloomington, Minnesota, offers his expectations for the market. Georgantones; "I think we are going to see very choppy markets through the month of December. Back and forth, ebbing and flowing here and position squaring before the all important stocks and acreage numbers. We get that about the 10th of January." On Friday Chicago March wheat was up 2 ¾ cents at 4-94 ¼. March corn down 2 ¾ at 3-69. Portland cash soft white wheat steady at mostly 4-90. Club wheat 4-90. HRW 11.5 percent protein unchanged to two cents higher at 5-75. Dark northern spring 14% protein two to five cents higher at 5-86. Barley at the coast 182 dollars a ton. USDA reported Friday that western states held 171 million hundredweight of potatoes in storage on December 1st, down four percent from last year. Idaho stocks were down one percent, Washington's down seven and Oregon's down 16 percent. Cattle futures were higher Friday. Factors cited were option trades, technical buying and a possible winter storm this week for some of the Plains feedlot areas. Feb live cattle up 117 at 89-50. Jan feeders up 132 at 98-72. Jan Class III milk unchanged at 13-15. I'm Bob Hoff and that's Marketline on the Northwest Ag Information Network. Now this.