Market’s Holiday Schedule

Even though Christmas is not until Monday the grain and livestock markets at the Chicago Board of Trade will close around noon today. The markets will not open again until 8:30 am Tuesday morning. Notice there will not be an overnight session Monday Christmas day evening. Normally the volume would be very light on a day like today. However if some unexpected news like a change in the forecast for South America would surface it could get really zippy. That is because many traders have already left for the holiday weekend.

Today is a big day for the cattle and hog markets as the monthly Cattle on Feed and Quarterly Hog and Pig Report will be released at 11:00 this morning. It seems a little unusual to have important reports released just an hour before the markets close for a long holiday weekend. So, there could be some excitement in the cattle and hog markets at 11:00. In addition to those two reports the USDA will also release the monthly Cold Storage Report this morning too.