Corn Historical Price Charts – ZC Price History

Corn is the world’s most important grain, based on the production volume. In 2019-20, the worldwide corn production was recorded as 1,114.75 million metric tons, with the United States at the top with 406,292,000 metric tons and China in second place with 260,000,000 metric tons. Brazil ranked third, with 106,000,000 metric tons of corn produced in 2019. Corn is one of the most important crops in the United States as, over the last years, the country’s corn farmers have experienced a constant increase in annual revenues. As with the production, the largest consumer country for corn is also the United States, with a consumption of 12.3 billion bushels of corn in 2019. In the same year, China came second in terms of consumption, at 10.98 billion bushels. The primary usage of corn includes livestock feed, ethanol production and manufactured goods. Corn futures are one of the most widely traded commodities futures products in the world. Corn futures started trading in the Chicago commodities futures markets in the mid-1880s. This high consumption grain is also known as the “other yellow gold” because of its value around the globe throughout most of the history of mankind. Like all other investments, the corn futures price fluctuates according to weather, supply, demand and speculation. Other than that, the ethanol demand, the demand from China, the Planting Intentions Report, the USDA report and the US dollar prices also affect the corn prices.

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Why Look at Historic Corn Prices?
There are manifold factors involved in the determination of a bearish bias in corn. Let’s explore them one by one, in order to forecast the corn prices.

Protection against Inflation:
In bad economic times, like the ongoing US-China trade war and the coronavirus pandemic crisis, that led to the global economic slowdown, the Central Banks from across the globe tend to print money to prevent the economy from falling into recession. However, this printing of money, or loose monetary policy, causes inflation, which in turn makes the money in bank accounts worthless. At such times, investing in a commodity like corn, can protect the value of money against inflation. This is because such commodities have a direct and positive correlation, which means that, with the increasing global inflation, the corn prices also increase and vice versa.

Ethanol Demand:
Other than its usage as a food, corn is also used to produce biofuels, such as ethanol. About 40% of the corn crop goes to ethanol production and most of what remains goes to feeding livestock. Only a small portion goes to human consumption. Therefore, it is important to monitor the prices of crude oil and gasoline, which determine the demand for ethanol. A cheap corn price while the price of crude oil is high can lead to an increased demand for ethanol. In the South, American ethanol is widely used for cars. The demand for biofuels has also been increasing in Europe recently, which has also raised the corn prices lately. The demand for biofuels is expected to increase in the coming years, as countries are seeking cleaner energy sources, and as a result, the corn prices will also increase, due to the increased demand for ethanol production.

Chinese Demand:
China’s demand for corn for animal feed has increased, as the number of pigs has rebounded more quickly than expected after the deadly swine disease, which was first detected in the country two years ago. Along with that, China’s pledge to buy more US farm products, as part of the Phase 1 trade deal with Washington, has also raised the demand for corn in China.

China is still far away from meeting its commitment of buying $ 36.5 billion worth of US agricultural goods, according to the Phase 1 agreement. The United States had exported about $ 7.274 billion in farm goods to China by the end of June. From January to June, the US exported 404,760 tonnes of Corn to China, which was a considerable increase, compared to 194,503 tonnes in the previous year.

Furthermore, the country has targets in place to increase biofuel consumption in the coming years, which could also increase the demand for corn. Meanwhile, with over a billion people whom China needs to feed, the country’s demand for corn will never decrease.

Planting Intentions Report:
In spring, the USDA’s Planting Intentions Report issues planting season figures for traders on financial markets. This report is released at the end of March. The said report tends to set the tone for the market for the season. The report discloses the amount of acreage that farmers anticipate planting for each crop. The fewer the acres planted, the lower the chance of a large crop. Analysts take the number of acres and multiply it by a trend yield, in order to get the expected size of the crop for the season, so that they can forecast the overall size of the crop. This report is viewed by the corn traders, and it also affects the prices of the commodity.

The USDA Report:
A detailed report about the demand for corn exports is released by the USDA every Thursday. Corn prices often move higher on the strong export report. The export prices of corn from other exporting countries should also be monitored. If the price of US corn is much higher than other competing countries, the chances for a strong export market will diminish.

Coronavirus Pandemic:
The price of corn futures fell by 15%, or 61 cents per bushel, to $ 3.35 per bushel in May, after the coronavirus pandemic forced nations worldwide to lockdown their economic and social activities. The decline was tied to the demand uncertainty that has followed the drop in ethanol future prices of nearly 40%. The prospects of 97 million acres of corn planted in 2020 also weighed heavily on corn prices. Corn has experienced a stronger reaction to COVID-19 measures, because of its usage in ethanol production, as the industries were shut down during the lockdown. Another major use of corn, namely for livestock feed, was also down, due to meat processing sectors being closed down, in order to protect workers from being infected by the COVID-19 virus.

Copper Historical Price Charts – Copper Price History

The market for copper is the third largest of all metals, behind iron and aluminum. The global market size of copper is valued at $ 261 Billion. Copper plays a vital role in global industrial production, and copper wire greatly impacts the telecom industry.

Copper is extracted from large open mines in West Africa, Europe, the Middle East, China and Central and South America. The demand for copper from China and India has been playing a dominant role in raising the prices for this metal in recent years. Chile and the United States have large copper reserves, which it is estimated will be depleted over the next 50 years. But, given the current demand, the copper reserves are likely to be depleted even earlier, in about 25 years.

The futures contracts of copper are traded with the LME in NYMEX, and they have the third largest trading volume after iron and aluminum. The factors that have an impact on copper prices include global economic growth, mining production, exploration of new mines, earthquakes, shipping problems, political unrest in Chile, Peru and South Africa, increased or decreased consumption of major nations like China, the US and the EU, inventory stocks in LME & NYMEX and the copper supply reports, including high-grade warehouse stocks.

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Copper – Historical Price Charts:

Why Look at Historic Copper Prices?
Copper is commonly used as an indicator of global economic health, due to its wide range of uses. There are manifold factors involved in the determination of a bullish bias in copper. Let’s explore them one by one, in order to forecast the copper prices.

Coronavirus Pandemic:
Copper prices left 2019 behind with expectations of a positive performance in 2020, due to the potential resolution of the US-China trade conflict, that had been impacting global economic growth in previous months. The industry experts and executives anticipated a bullish trend for copper in 2020, as they had predicted a surge in large infrastructure projects across the world.
Copper prices were hard hit in 2019, as a result of President Trump’s severe measures against China, which led to the trade war between the US and China. This move ended up halting the global economic growth, which is another factor that impacts on copper prices.

However, the copper price had recovered by the end of the year, as the hopes for a settlement started to emerge in the market, raising expectations for significant recovery.

Nonetheless, a sharp decline in commodity prices started to hit the market on January 15, after the emergence of the contagious virus in Wuhan, China. This raised concerns, as lockdown restrictions, which affected economic activities in industrial production, began to be imposed all over the globe.

The copper prices were stable for most of February, until the World Health Organization finally declared a global pandemic. As a result, the copper prices fell by 19%, to $ 2.10, which is the lowest level for the year, to date.

Global Economic Downturn:
The price of copper is often used as a benchmark for gauging the health of the global economy. The two are directly related, which means that if the global economy is in a period of sustained growth, the price of copper is usually high, as, at such times, the industrial demand for the metal is also high. On the other hand, in periods of economic downturn, the price of copper is low, due to low levels of spending on infrastructure growth.

In the first quarter of 2020, the global GDP reduced at an annual rate of 4.8%, while the 4th quarter of 2019 reported a 2.1% increase in global GDP. The economy was already disrupted, due to the ongoing US-China trade war. Then the coronavirus pandemic added to the pressure, causing a sudden decline in the global GDP.

Speculating on the prices of copper can provide a trend for world growth or GDP. The copper prices fell by 21.13% in the first quarter of 2020, suggesting a bearish view on world growth in the same period.

Reduced demand from major markets:
The countries with rapid development are the main contributors to the copper market, as their demand for copper increases, due to extensive spending on transport infrastructure and housing developments. As a result, emerging markets, like China, Brazil and India have a large share in the global copper demand. After the coronavirus outbreak in Wuhan, China was forced to shut down all industrial activities in February and March 2020.
In March, China’s industrial production declined significantly, by 13.5%; this weighed on the demand for copper.

The spread of the coronavirus across the world forced all other countries to halt all economic activities by the end of March. This also resulted in a decline in metal consumption in Europe and the United States; the continuous decline led to stockpiling.

In Q1 2020, the copper inventories in Shanghai warehouses and metal exchanges surged by about 46%, to 955,000 Mt. Meanwhile, the refined copper inventories in the major global exchanges also increased by 50%, as per data released by the Chilean Copper Commission. These raised inventories, due to lower demand, as a result of the economic shutdown, added to the declining copper prices in the first quarter of 2020.

Supply constraints:
The lockdown across the world, to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, halted mining activities for copper and other metals, causing delays in several projects. The biggest copper mining facility in Chile, Codelco, also reduced its operational activities, due to the government’s state of emergency orders. The mines in Chile and Peru, which together account for nearly 40% of the global production, remained closed for about 15 days. In some other countries, like the Democratic Republic of Congo, Mexico and Zambia, mining production was also suspended. This halted the supply of copper to manage the increasing number of stockpiles.

However, the decline in the demand for copper, amid the lockdown restrictions and rising fears of a global recession, outweighed the supply constraints and pushed the copper prices to their lowest level in three years.

Prices Reversed to Bullish Bias
When China’s lockdown was lifted on March 24, after 76 days, the copper prices jumped by almost 76%, since the trade was reversed, even though prices had accumulated a 19.3% decline. The surge in copper prices was due to China reopening the markets and other countries that raised hopes for economic recovery.

Government stimulus packages, combined with the news of the lifting of restrictions, gave the copper prices a boost in April. As the rest of the world remained locked down in April, the continued supply constraints pushed the copper prices onto the upside.

As most counties reopened their economies in May, the anticipated improvement in demand kept the prices high in May.

Aluminum Historical Price Charts – Aluminum Price History

Aluminum is the second most widely used metal, after iron, and it is in high demand in the growing economies and for global consumption. It is generally used in Aircraft and Aerospace, Aluminum Cars, Automotive, Building and Construction, Electronics and Appliances, Solar Panel Nanotechnology and Foil and Packaging. The prices of aluminum are highly dependent on global demand, the construction industry and news from producers. The top three aluminum- producing countries are China, Russia and Canada.

The biggest consumer of aluminum, with a very high demand, is China, where urbanization has boosted consumption. China uses about 40% of the annual global supply of aluminum. After China, the next largest consumers of this metal are Japan, the European Union and the United States.

Aluminum prices have been linked to the growth in the Chinese GDP over the past two decades; it has pushed many industrial commodity prices higher. The packaging sector, real estate, transportation, construction and the electronics sectors in China and worldwide have raised the demand for aluminum.

[[Aluminum-graph]]

Why Look at Historical Aluminum Prices?

There are manifold factors involved in the determination of a bullish bias in aluminum. Let’s explore them one by one, in order to forecast the aluminum prices.

Chinese Demand and Overcapacity:
The biggest producer and consumer of aluminum is China, as the fast-growing Chinese economy has needed aluminum for construction, transportation and electronics in recent years. However, as the Gross Domestic Product of China dropped, the internal demand could not absorb the large supply, causing China to export the metal to the United States and other countries.

However, despite the massive aluminum overcapacity in China, the local government continued to pursue industrial policies, in order to expand the production. Over the past five years, China's overcapacity has grown by 60%, and this has resulted in a distortion of the global markets, due to increasing exports of the metal to third-party countries.

According to the National Bureau of Statistics, smelters in China produced about 3.02Mt of primary aluminum in June. This was the highest amount ever for June, as the total annual output was up by 1.7%. Despite this, the Chinese government set up a new production line, with a capacity of 680,000 tons per year in the first six months of 2020. These new capacities alone were equal to nearly 40% of the total US aluminum smelting capacity.

China also provided $ 60-70 Billion in indirect government subsidies to five aluminum-producing firms, and this played an important role in the overcapacity. This subsidized overcapacity of aluminum in China is a fundamental trade challenge, which the US aluminum industry is having to face, as they are going out of business.

Transportation Demand & Construction Industry Demand:

Automobiles and aerospace are the most important markets for aluminum in the developed world. The global economy depends on transportation to support growth. As the global economy expands, the need for automobile and aerospace also increases, and this causes a surge in the demand for aluminum.

As we know, in the first quarter of 2020, the global GDP in G20 fell by 3.4%, which was the record in terms of large contraction since 1998. This means that the aluminum prices also suffered, due to less economic growth, which led to low economic activity, which supports the transportation sector.

The aluminum consumption for the world's largest buyer of the metal, China, fell for the first time in three decades in 2019, to the tune of 1%. As a result, China made plans to add 2.25M tons to their annual aluminum smelting capacity. The second-largest industrial demand sector for aluminum is the construction and building
market. Aluminum amounts to about 30% of the cost of building materials in developing countries.

Construction figures are volatile, so the unemployment rates, job data, interest rates and economic growth activities in consumer countries, like China, the US, Europe and Japan, are an important factor in moving the aluminum prices.

The Great Canadian Aluminum Distraction:
Recently, the US Trump Administration re-imposed tariffs on aluminum imports from Canada, amid the surging supply, which rose above the historical levels. But the rise in Canada's aluminum exports to the United States had only intensified in recent months, despite a drop in demand from the US. This called for a move to secure the domestic aluminum industry.

However, the next day, Canada retaliated by announcing tariffs on US aluminum products, on the grounds of national security. These tariffs have also kept the aluminum prices under pressure recently.

Coronavirus Pandemic:
The automotive manufacturing and construction sectors were primarily affected by the coronavirus induced lockdowns, which significantly affected the aluminum industry worldwide. Aluminum prices dropped from $ 1,820 per ton in January to $ 1,425.5 per ton in April.

However, the prices were not as affected by the coronavirus as other commodities were, because as the demand for that metal decreased from one sector, demand in other sectors increased. The demand for the transport, construction and consumer electronic sectors decreased during the pandemic lockdowns. But, at the same time, the demand for aluminum increased for printed circuit board components for medical devices, like ventilators.

The supply chain was also interrupted, due to the travel restrictions and the closure of ports; however, the supply of aluminum was not affected.

ChainLink Historical Price Charts – ChainLink Price History

ChainLink is the first platform of its kind and it can be described as a decentralized oracle service. It is a blockchain designed to link the blockchain technology-based smart contracts with other user programs and APIs. The circulating supply of ChainLink is 390 million coins with 1 Million coins as a maximum supply limit.

In the crypto market, ChainLink (LINK) has become a popular currency as it now falls under the top 5 cryptocurrencies in terms of volume. According to market capitalization, ChainLink is the most valuable DeFi token. The rise in popularity of ChainLink is derived from the increased interest of crypto traders and investors, since the start of the coronavirus pandemic. ChainLink has gained a lot of attention since then, becoming the fifth most important currency on the basis
of market capitalization. The reason behind its rise in demand is linked to the fact that blockchains cannot have access to outside data from their path, and in order to facilitate data feeds in the smart contract, a DeFi instrument like ChainLink is needed. So, in short, ChainLink provides a communication service between smart contracts and off-chain systems and APIs.

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Factors affecting ChainLink (LINK) prices:

Decentralized Finance (DeFi):
The Decentralized Finance (DeFi) protocols have a significant influence over other cryptocurrencies. The continuous growth in the DeFi sector has increased the need for reliable and decentralized oracles that can provide outside information on the smart contracts. The DeFi tokens, such as Synthetix, have grown extensively recently, as they are dependent on oracles for their data, and ChainLink is used for this purpose. So the increased demand for DeFi tokens has pushed the LINK prices higher.

ChainLink Partnerships:
Recently the massive rally in the ChainLink prices was caused by the interest in it, mainly from China. Binance, the world’s largest bitcoin and cryptocurrency exchange by volume, started working with the developers of ChainLink, using their DeFi products.

In mid-July, the prices of ChainLink (LINK) surged after a dual-chain architecture from the major crypto exchange, Binance integrated ChainLink data orders. The integration expanded the limit of its smart contract of Binance to areas like DeFi, payments and asset management.

Moreover, ChainLink has established a number of important collaborations over the years, including the most important one, with tech giant Google, in June 2019. The partnership between ChainLink and Google enabled Google Cloud users to use ChainLink to connect Bigquery. This news had a big impact on the ChainLink (LINK) price, as LINK has seen a serious surge in prices since then.

Some of ChainLink’s other important partnerships include Intel, since October 2019, and Deutsche Telekom, National Blockchain Services Network and Oracle, since June 2019.

Bitcoin Cash Historical Price Charts – SV Price History

Bitcoin Cash SV, or Bitcoin SV, is a cryptocurrency, which was created in 2018. The reason behind its formation could be attributed to the Bitcoin Cash (BCH) hard fork. When the Bitcoin (BTC) netsplit occurred, the new cryptocurrency team was not in agreement on its further development.

It is worth recalling that two opposing groups were formed around Bitcoin Cash. One of them followed the same policies that applied to BCH from the start; the second group wanted a different set of agreement rules for Bitcoin Cash. This was seen as one of the biggest reasons for a further netsplit on November 15, 2018, from which Bitcoin SV emerged, due to Bitcoin Cash SV (BCHSV).

Main principles of Bitcoin SV:

The Bitcoin SV (BSV)’s primary purpose is to become the most famous and most commonly used cryptocurrency in the world. Moreover, the aim is for it to be fully decentralized; however, it’s difficult to discuss the topic, as the company that owns Bitcoin SV is a private one. It is also worth mentioning that nearly 80% of the computing powers of the BSV net lie within 3-mining pools that belong to the promoters and the creator of the cryptocurrency.

Thereby, the vision of the BSV cryptocurrency concentrates on four-elements: scalability, safety, a stable protocol and secure spot transactions.

Scalability:

If Bitcoin SV (BSV) wants to function as a global financial platform, it must prove that it is ready to process the required transaction volume. That’s why BSV concentrates on increasing the size of its blocks and improving its productivity rate. However, the mass scalability is seen as a key factor that allows Bitcoin SV blockchain to manage more transactions and increase the miners’ transaction fees. Scalability should also urge companies to use BSV in applications based on blockchain, and that needs large blocks and a high capacity.

Safety:

To become an international currency, the Bitcoin SV (BSV) must ensure a safety level that corresponds with the global financial system. In this way, Bitcoin SV concentrates on the high-quality standards of its mining software. Firstly, it follows specialized external knowledge in the field of quality control. This project also cooperates with audit companies. Moreover, the Bitcoin SV also has a facilitating bonus scheme, which rewards users for any bugs detected, with the aim of motivating and mobilizing the safety controllers to make an effort to search for and report any security breaches.

Stable protocol:

According to the BSV Team, the target of the cryptocurrency is to ensure stability with the limited and well-known set of changes, which attempts to bring back the original Bitcoin protocol and allow for innovations based on a stable primary protocol.

Secure spot transactions:

BSV considers the security of spot transactions to be its top priority

Differences Between Bitcoin SV & Bitcoin Cash:

There are many differences between Bitcoin SV & Bitcoin Cash, although, one of the essential differences could be the maximum capacity of a transaction block. In Bitcoin SV, it’s 128 MB (the plan is to increase it to 512 MB in the future); in Bitcoin Cash, it’s just 32 MB (initially, it was 8 MB).

Another leading difference between BCH and BSV could be that the first cryptocurrency has an operational code called OP_CHECKDATASIG. It was designed to confirm information from outside the blockchain. It is related to improving functionality in smart contracts. Bitcoin SV has ensured that they do not require such a solution.

Bitcoin Cash Historical Price Charts – BCH Price History

Bitcoin cash is a cryptocurrency that was founded in August 2017, a peer-to-peer electronic cash system that proposes to become sound global money with fast payments, privacy, micro fees and high transaction capacity (big blocks). Bitcoin Cash payments are transferred directly from one person to another, the same way that physical money, such as a dollar bill, is handed directly to the person being paid.

It is also worth mentioning that, as a permissionless, decentralized cryptocurrency, Bitcoin Cash does not need any central bank or trusted third parties. Furthermore, Bitcoin Cash does not depend on monetary middlemen such as banks and payment processors, unlike traditional fiat currency. The transactions tend not to be controlled by governments or other centralized corporations. Likewise, funds cannot be frozen or caught, as financial third -parties have no authority to control the Bitcoin Cash network.

From a historical viewpoint, the average size of a block on Bitcoin’s blockchain was just under 100 KB during 2010. The average fee for a transaction amounted to a couple of cents. This made the Bitcoin blockchain vulnerable to attacks, entirely made up of cheap transactions, that could have crippled the system. Thus, the size of a block on Bitcoin’s blockchain was limited to 1 MB, to prevent such a situation. Each block was generated every 10 minutes, allowing for space and time between consecutive transactions. Limiting the size and time required to generate a block added another layer of security to Bitcoin’s blockchain.

Uses of Bitcoin Cash:

It is worth recalling that Bitcoin Cash combines scarcity of a gold-like nature with the spendability of cash. Due to the limited total supply of 21 million coins, Bitcoin Cash is rare and it can easily be used like physical cash. As we have already mentioned, Bitcoin cash transactions are fast, and transaction fees are normally less than one-tenth of a cent. The majority of people can accept Bitcoin Cash payments with a computer or smartphone.

As a result, Bitcoin Cash can be used in many situations. Besides the peer-to-peer payments between individuals, Bitcoin Cash can also be used to pay participating retailers for goods and services in-store and online. Moreover, Bitcoin Cash also diminishes the charges and settlement times for payments and cross-border trade. In addition to this, the use of Bitcoin Cash includes tokens, simplified smart contracts, and private payments with tools such as CashShuffle and CashFusion.

The difference between Bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash:

During 2017, the Bitcoin project and its team were divided regarding two different concerns about the scalability of the cryptocurrency. As a result, Bitcoin Cash created a new cryptocurrency, which all supporters considered to be the legitimate continuation of the Bitcoin project, in the form of peer-to-peer electronic cash. As a result of this division (block 478,558), the holders of Bitcoins automatically became owners of Bitcoin Cash.

In contrast to Bitcoin BTC, Bitcoin Cash proposes to scale itself in order to meet the global payment system demands. During the division, the Bitcoin Cash block size rose from 1MB to 8MB, which means that Bitcoin Cash can now handle significantly more transactions per second (TPS), whilst keeping fees very cheap.

Major Factors that Influence the Bitcoin (BTC):

The supply of bitcoin and the demand for it on the market
The cost of generating a bitcoin via the mining method
The awards issued to bitcoin miners for verifying transactions to the blockchain
The number of competing cryptocurrencies
The exchanges it trades on
Regulations governing its sale
Its internal governance

Bitcoin Cash (BCH) – Historical Price Charts and Data

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Now, let me explain some significant factors that impact Bitcoin (BTC) significantly:

Cost of Production:

Electricity consumption could be considered as one of the most critical factors in the mining process, by far. Bitcoin ‘mining’ depends on complicated cryptographic math problems that all miners have to solve. The first one to do so is rewarded with a block of newly minted bitcoins, and any transaction fees that have accumulated since the last block was found. Unlike other produced goods, Bitcoin’s algorithm only allows for one block of Bitcoins to be found, on average, once every ten minutes. That means that the higher the number of generators who join in the race for solving the math problem, the more difficult – and thus the more expensive – it becomes to solve the problem and preserve that ten-minute interval.

Supply and Demand:

The supply of Bitcoin is normally effected in two different ways. Firstly, the Bitcoin protocol allows new Bitcoins to be created at a fixed rate. New Bitcoins are introduced into the market when miners process blocks of transactions, and the rate at which new coins are introduced is designed to slow down over time. Case in point: growth slowed from 6.9% (2016), to 4.4% (2017) to 4.0% (2018). In turn, the demand for Bitcoins tends to increase faster than the supply increases, which can underpin the price. The slowing of Bitcoin circulation growth is due to the halving of block rewards offered to Bitcoin miners and can be thought of as artificial inflation for the cryptocurrency ecosystem.

On the other hand, the supply could also be impacted by the number of Bitcoins the system allows to exist. This number is capped at 21 million, whereby once this number has been reached, mining activities will no longer create new Bitcoins. For example, the supply of Bitcoins was 18.1 million in December 2019, representing 86.2% of the supply of Bitcoins that will ultimately be made available. As soon as 21 million Bitcoins are in circulation, prices will depend on whether it is considered practical (readily usable in transactions), legal and in demand, which will be determined by the popularity of other cryptocurrencies. The artificial inflation mechanism of the halving of block rewards will no longer impact the price of the cryptocurrency. However, at the current rate of adjustment of block rewards, the last Bitcoin is not set to be mined until 2140.

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