Ord Talk

A Federal Judge ruled Tuesday that Verasun will not have to honor corn contracts made to farmers. Click on the links below to read the full stories. Ord is one of the locations where the contracts will not be reviewed or honored. http://www.reuters.com/article/bondsNews/idUSN0227115520081202 "Lawyers and representatives for corn farmers blasted the court's ruling on the 10-day notice for canceling corn contracts. That short notice would leave corn farmers stuck holding corn until the last minute, making them susceptible to the sharp swings in prices and unable to secure financing to run their farms, Joseph Peiffer, a lawyer for many of the corn growers, argued at the hearing. Keith Bolin, president of the American Corn Growers Association said the ruling would put farmers into "indentured servitude" to VeraSun, since they could not sell their crops to other buyers until VeraSun canceled the contracts. "They have a captive supply of grain all the way out to 2011 with no guarantee of price," Bolin told Reuters outside the courtroom." http://www.desmoinesregister.com/article/20081202/NEWS/81202031/1001/NEWS "The farmers had argued that VeraSun's bankruptcy, declared Oct. 31, threatened their forward contracts due next winter and spring because the delivery prices are well above the current market price of corn, which closed Tuesday on the Chicago Board of Trade at $3.32 per bushel. Corn prices reached $8 per bushel last summer and some farmers took out forward contracts to sell for delivery this winter and spring at prices at $6 per bushel or higher." It doesn't look like a very Merry Christmas from here. Somewhere along the line we all got scrooged. All I can say is hang in there and hope the prices on the open market go up, otherwise we are going to be paying for this for a long, long time.