Tuesday, August 18, 2009

Playing the Sugar Rush

From Seeking Alpha

Although sugar's still way off its record high of 66 cents/lb (set back in 1974), the commodity is still up 88% year-to-date.

The rise has been spectacular, but some analysts think sugar's future looks even sweeter. Take Jim Rogers, who told Bloomberg earlier this month that "sugar is certainly going to go much, much higher during the course of the bull market."

Investors seeking an exchange-traded play on sugar can check out the futures-based iPath Dow Jones AIG Sugar Total Return Sub-Index ETN (NYSE Arca: SGG). Year-to-date, SGG is up 62%, and lately has been one of the better performers in our Breakfast Index.

Other sugar-related (although more broadly based) exchange-traded vehicles include the PowerShares DB Agriculture Fund (NYSE Arca: DBA), which tracks futures in corn, soybeans, wheat and sugar; and the ELEMENTS Rogers International Commodity Agriculture ETN (NYSE Arca: RJA), which tracks 20 futures contracts worldwide.