Normally at this time of year, seasonal cotton traders would be looking forward to peeling off a monthlong position in the July delivery that's proved to be a fairly reliable winner. A purchase in the second week of February ordinarily—that is, 80 percent of the time—turns a $1,150-per-contract profit. Or rather, turned a profit.

Real-time Monetary Inflation (last 12 months): 2.3%

Earlier this week ("Add Soft Wheat To Your Hard Asset List"), we noted bottoming action and bullish seasonality in Chicago wheat futures bolstering the price of the iPath Dow Jones-UBS Grains Subindex Total Return ETN (NYSE Arca: JJG).

Most people don't think of meat as a hard asset. After all, you want your steak tender, don't you? Still, the cattle market has been cooking since the beginning of February. Yesterday's 40-cent (0.4 percent) gain notched the fifth straight higher close for April live cattle.

• Equities beat futures in 2009
• How DBA's lineup has changed
• Why future backwardation isn't a given

Serious foodies know that invert sugar, a mixture of glucose and fructose, is sweeter than the sucrose from which it is derived; traders know how to sweeten profits when the sugar market inverts.

• Why ag stocks missed out on 2009's equity market low
• Which ag stocks have outperformed this year
• Could DBA outperform MOO in 2010?

• Why snow won't necessarily stop the harvest
• Will corn prices keep going up?
• Which ETPs have corn exposure?

• Why revenues fell even though margins improved
• The ‘three strikes’ pitched to first-gen ethanol refiners
• Where are they now?

The commodities expert shares his opinions on regulatory issues, the energy markets and the U.S. government's spending spree, among other topics.

• Alternative energy's brilliant future
• Is BRIC just a marketing scam?
• Sugar's sweet scope
   

• LSC vs. DJP: ETNs side by side
• Contango’s impact on both
• LSC’s shifting composition