"The crops are hurting, " said Chad Hart, a grain market specialist at Iowa State University.

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The current nature of the grain market also does not work in American Commercial's favor.

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Rice wholesalers at Sanyanqiao Grain Wholesale Market, one of Guangdong's largest grain markets, had stopped selling rice from Hunan, an executive from the market told The Wall Street Journal on Wednesday.

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Midwestern hog farmers, with easy access to cheap corn and other grain, dominated the hog market.

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In fact, take all such daily explanations of market turbulence with a grain of salt.

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Along with that, grape growers must accept that their chosen profession is subject to the same market forces as every other commodity, from grain to natural gas.

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Some brands are being transplanted into adjacent markets: the new Hovis Breakfast Bake is a whole-grain biscuit that Premier hopes will take some of the growing market for on-the-go breakfasts.

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Mike Norman, editor of the Economic Contrarian Update, usually holds against-the-grain opinions, although his latest comments seem to echo a growing consensus: the bull market for homebuilders is over.

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About 7, 000 cases have been filed by long-grain rice farmers seeking to recoup income they claim they lost as a result of the drop in market price for rice.

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Because grain could be standardized, its values could be abstracted to finance, forming the basis of the futures market which fairly quickly outgrew the value of the physical markets.

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