Conversation

“Even if there were 83.85 million pounds of acceptable quality potatoes still available from last fall's harvest in Maine, it would be physically impossible to bring them to the Harlem River rail yards and other specific delivery points in New York before this afternoon.”
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“Under the rules of the Mercantile Echange, speculators are limited to 150 contracts in any one delivery month, while hedgers may own as many as they can justify by having either inventory or the ability to produce the commodity.”
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Naively, I had hoped that if people were forecasting possible food shortages in other parts of the world later this year, given short-term inelasticity of the food supply and relatively long shelf life of potatoes, someone would want to pay to store these. Seems like no?
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