Lumber is one of the most illiquid commodities that trade on the futures markets. Many market participants in the lumber and construction business complain that the lack of liquidity makes the futures market virtually useless as a hedging vehicle. However, I view lumber futures as a benchmark even though it is untradable.
Lumber is one of the critical industrial commodities. The price of crude oil can tell us a lot about the global economic condition because expansion tends to lead to increasing demand while contraction often means that demand for the energy commodity declines. Copper