class action suit

[charliep]

Erik

Would the CWB have sold in the last 4 months? They were already short the market to the tune of 700,000 tonnes (their number) out of a total malt barley pool size of 1.4 to 2.1 MMT. As a farmer, would you have pushed your pricing beyond a third (optimistic about the crop) to a half (realistic about malt supplies) of the expected size of the 2007/08 pooling year. From a risk management stand, why would the CWB operate the pool any different than you would on your farm?

Bennyhin - What risk management strategies did the CWB do to look after the price risk they took on in forward pricing 700,000 tonnes of 2007 crop? Should this be a part of the class action law suit?

[chaffmeister]

The export sales the CWB is saying they've missed are feed barley sales. Charlie, you're right - they would not have sold any malt barley in the last for months because they don't pre-sell export malt barley - just domestic. So they've missed out on nothing in terms of malt barley sales.

As for feed barley and losing out on potential sales, I would hope that they would have sold something by now, with or without a single desk. I think the reason they didn't was simple positioning based on political strategies. In other words, it had nothing to do with real marketing.

[charliep]

Chaffmeister

The CWB and the grain companies had discussions prior to the sales being made - the business is done under a promised open market. Perhaps one of the differences is the grain companies have the sales covered through farmer contracts which include a full price paid at delivery. The single desk would have shorted the market (the way they did with malt barley) and then struggled to get deliveries based on poor market signals like we are seeing with current initial payments.

Sorry about taking off topic. The original thread was about a class action suit.

[charliep]

Again off topic but everyone should watch S&D tables for both the past year and the coming one. I will note the weather departments western Canadian barley production forecast of 11.3 MMT. Adding eastern Canada brings production to 12 MMT plus/minus. When you include an extra 500,000 plus of feed exports, the carryover looks to be close to 1.5 MMT again July 31, 2008 - a repeat of the current summers tight supplies.

[charliep]

thanks Charlie, got me straighten out now. back to the class action suit, how much do you think farmers lost? the markets will recover some what to what it was prior to wendesday, yet there is a loss but how much?
Erik

[charliep]

erik

Will do a summary over the next couple of days. Short answer is lots of other market factors are coming into play. Another factor is the grain companies/CWB are working on a process to ensure the 500,000 to 600,000 tonnes gets done. Likely can cut deals to put on additional sales. This is likely all the market needed to hear for the moment to prevent further declines. The real proof will be cash markets this coming month.

Malsters are the ones who will really get squeezed again. They still are not able to get market signals out to farmers to ensure barley is brought in for selection and to ensure farmers are willing to store to next summer. Under the theory, you can't force a buyer to pay more and you can't force a farmer to deliver, don't know how you would prove damages. At the end of the day, it will be opportunity lost.

[parsley]

If farmers have good malting barley, deliver to Rahr. They support farmers.

Period

As for the rest of the Canadian maltsters, if I had any malt barley, feeding it to cows would be my choice. The maltsters didn't support choice for farmers at all. I'd remember that when I'd sell my barley.

Steers are more appreciative of what Western farmers need than Canadian maltsters, in my humble opinion.

Parsley