Online Grain Marketing Game Offered by MU Extension

This summer MU Extension will coordinate the Show-Me Market Showdown, an educational online grain marketing simulation for farmers, ag professionals and other individuals or groups who are interested in learning about grain marketing. The Show-Me Market Showdown offers participants a ‘hands-on’ learning experience where they can enhance their grain marketing knowledge and skills by experimenting with different grain marketing tools and strategies in a life-like market setting.

The premise of the simulation is for each participant to sell and/or hedge predetermined quantities of corn, soybeans, and wheat, utilizing real-time cash bids, futures prices, and options quotes. The game employs a website called Commodity Challenge to link real-time market information with players’ ability to execute virtual marketing transactions. The website monitors players’ market positions, executes their trades, and summarizes players’ virtual marketing account balances.

Players compete with one another based on the financial outcome of their sales and trades relative to other players’ marketing transactions. Although the game is competitive, the main focus of the game is for players to learn the risks and rewards of alternative marketing strategies and to learn the mechanics of various marketing tools, such as futures contracts, options on futures, and forward contracts. To this end, in addition to the game, MU Extension will offer players guidance and instruction through weekly educational e-mails and a game blog. The e-mails and blog will provide a valuable means of discussion and instruction among the game coordinators and participants.

In addition to being fun and educational, participation in the Show-Me Market Showdown is extremely flexible and risk-free. Since the game is hosted online, players can access the game whenever and wherever they have time and access to the Internet. There are no formal meeting times or locations for game participants, which makes participation easy for busy farmers and ag professionals. Furthermore, while all trades in the game utilize real market quotes and life-like brokerage execution, players have no risk of financial loss by participating in the game. The risk-free nature of the Show-Me Market Showdown is a major advantage to learning about marketing tools and strategies through the simulation rather than in the real world where experimentation with various marketing tools and strategies poses enormous financial risk.

The Show-Me Market Showdown will run from July 14th to September 19th.

Funding for this project was provided by the North Central Risk Management Education Center and the USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture. As a result, participation in the game is completely free.

More information and instructions to register for the Show-Me Market Showdown can be found at http://extension.missouri.edu/lafayette/ShowMeMarketShowdown.aspx or by contacting Whitney Wiegel, MU Extension Agricultural Business Specialist, at 660-584-3658 or WiegelW@missouri.edu.