12/28/05 Fund short covering send wheat higher

Wheat futures settled higher on Tuesday. Chicago was supported by fund short-covering. Chicago March wheat ended 5 1/2 cents higher at $3.40, KC March was 5 1/4 cents higher at $3.85 3/4 and Minneapolis March was 3 cents higher at $3.87. Analyst Peter George Intomes says it's been building to this. INTOMES "The funds are short wheat up their eyeballs especially in Chicago and the small spec is short wheat up to his eyeballs as well and when you get a situation like this, I'm talking 50, 60, 65 thousand contracts on the short side then you can sort of see you know that there's going to come a point where we can stabilize the other grains where these funds are going to be forced to buy their way out of this thing." On Tuesday Chicago March wheat was up 5 ½ to 3.40. March corn up 1 ½ to 2.15 ½. That's the seventh consecutive higher session for corn. Portland cash white mostly 3.46. Club White unchanged at 3.94. Pacific Northwest HRW 11.5 percent protein mostly 4.69. Dark Northern Spring 14 percent protein up .03 to 5.12. Cattle futures ended narrowly mixed on Tuesday. The lack of direction from the cash market and limited volume led to the choppy session. The Cattle on Feed report was apparently already factored into the market. February live cattle up .05 to 95.78. March feeders gained .28 to 113.70. February Class III milk at Chicago down .07 at 12.75.