Jumping Bean

One of the few markets where a speculator can still make a killing with a small capital outlay is soybean futures--and last week even amateurs were cleaning up. An electrician walked into Bache & Co.'s Chicago office, peeled off $5,700 in $100 bills, and bought a futures contract for 40,000 bushels of soybeans by putting up only 10% of the purchase price. He sold out less than one hour later with a $1,200 profit. A Chicago real estate man invested $4,800, quit within 2 1/2 hours while he was $1,200 ahead. A professional soybean trader made $150,000 in 19 trading days.

Never had the soybean futures market been so active. At Chicago's Board of Trade, the world's largest soybean exchange, trading volume last week shot to a record of more than 400 million bushels, and the price of May soybeans, the most actively traded contracts, climbed to $2.56, a four-year high for futures, before easing to $2.47.

Reports of an impending world shortage of soybeans in 1961 started the beans jumping. The Department of Agriculture estimated the 1960 U.S. harvest at 559 million bushels, barely enough to meet anticipated demand. From Red China, the world's second largest producer (after the U.S.), came reports of a decimated soybean crop. Actions of Iron Curtain countries that depend on the Chinese harvest seemed to confirm the rumor: Russia de faulted on bean deliveries to West Germany and Denmark; East Germany began buying beans on free world markets. Even Red China itself began seeking liquid oils from India and South America. Mediterranean countries, notably Spain, reported olive harvests were 10% off, indicating there would be an increased demand for soybeans as a substitute source of oil.

Manufacturers who use the bean were grumbling about the higher prices, now 13% above the November level. Procter & Gamble, followed by a host of other companies, raised wholesale prices of bulk shortening by 1-c- per Ib. Kraft Foods warned that it might have to increase the price on a pound of margarine by a penny or so when its present supply of soybean oil is exhausted. Poultry and cattle feed producers also expected to have to raise prices to offset the increased cost of the soybean. There is little prospect of early relief for the processors. The price of soybeans is expected to keep soaring until it reaches $3 a bushel this year before it levels off.

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