HardAssetsInvestor

Written by Stacey Brorup  |

October 15, 2012

Contango Report: Brent’s Backwardation Widens, Oil Benchmark Remains Superior To WTI

Details

Investors should look to Brent for oil exposure, not WTI.

Featured Commodity

CONTANGO WATCH: Brent's backwardation widened last week as prices rose to three-week highs. The European oil benchmark remains superior to its U.S. counterpart, WTI, for investors looking for exposure to crude prices.

In addition to upside from a potential rise in front-month prices, investors gain an annualized roll yield of 11 percent by holding Brent contracts and rolling them over. That's in contrast to WTI, where it costs more than 5 percent to roll front-month contracts.

ROLL COSTS: Investors net 11.07 percent annualized from rolling front-month Brent contracts, up from a net of 8.30 percent.

BOTTOM LINE: Backwardation


Has oil moved into backwardation yet? What does corn's roll yield look like? How do you know when it's time to buy—or sell?

Each week, we investigate the futures curves of the most important commodities in the U.S., helping investors better understand the market and seize buy-and-sell opportunities as soon as they arise. For an easy-to-understand explanation of contango, backwardation and roll yields, please click here to go to our Hard Assets University.

To see current contango curve and front-month roll costs for each of our selected commodities, please select a sector or commodity below (or read the whole report):

Data as of close on Oct. 12, 2012
Data courtesy IndexUniverse.com