Monday, July 18, 2011

That's all folks

 photo credit hark.com


Appropriately, we'll use Porky Pig's phrase to say that's all folks for the pork belly contract as it is officially delisted today after a long decline in the use of the contract.

Above is a photo from the opening of the pork belly contract in September 1961 and the caption of the photo is "A noisy opening greets he start of trading in frozen pork bellies Monday on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange."  The Merc always was prominently Jewish and there is a certain irony in the price being more or less set by those who are forbidden to consume the product.

I used to work for a small firm w/operations at the KCBT/MGEX and every year the owner would invite all their employees up to their lake home in Wisconsin, even me the lowly KCBT clerk.  Their boat was simply named PBQ, which is the commodity code for "August 'bellies," just brilliant.