Overview
The Current Trading Position tab of the Grain Dashboard is designed to give merchandisers vision to the trading position for up to five commodities simultaneously, in real-time mode. Changes in values displayed for the various components of a commodity’s net trading position (i.e. purchase contracts, sales contracts, futures sold, etc.) are highlighted after the screen is refreshed. A drill down feature is available to display the detail behind the values displayed in the grid.
Setup and Use
Minimal setup is required to use the Grain Dashboard's Current Trading Position tab. The Save Set feature is available for setting and saving criteria to be used for future viewings. Filter items that can be set include: commodity, location, display to nearest ‘000, reduce periods and refresh rate (minutes). A maximum of five commodities can be selected and refreshed at one time. When five or fewer commodities exist in the database, all commodities are automatically selected.
After a saved set has been selected and loaded, the width of columns on each position tab may be adjusted to the desired width. By right clicking on the header, users will be given an opportunity to Make This Layout My Default.
The interval for refreshing the screen can be set by entering the amount of time (in minutes) in the Refresh Rate text box and clicking the Set Timer button. This will automate the grid's reloading interval. The Refresh button will turn red when the grid is in the process of refreshing. To indicate that a change has occurred for a value displayed in the grid after a refresh occurs, the cell will turn yellow. The cell will remain highlighted until the Clear button is clicked or the cell is double-clicked to drill down and view the detail behind the value. The Clear button will clear all highlighted cells until there is another refresh that records a change.
After selecting commodities and setting any of the other filters, use the Refresh button to load the current trading position information. The All Commodities – Line Totals tab displays the Line Totals column from each of the selected commodities. Each subsequent tab displays a more detailed breakdown of the trading position for each individual commodity. The maximum number of trading period columns on a commodity tab (when the Reduce Periods filter is not checked) would be 12 plus a Line Totals column. The first column is the Near column and is the current month's position as it relates to the report date. The next columns are the positions for a number of individual monthly periods (depending on how the Reduced Period filter is set). The final monthly period column is the FWD column and it contains the combined values for all future months beyond the individual month column that immediately precedes it.
If future months that are summarized in the FWD column need to be displayed in their respective monthly columns, change the report date to a future date that is just prior to those months to display each month individually.
Each commodity tab shows the net position from the last time a DPR was posted for the commodity. In most cases, this will represent the commodity’s net position at the end of the previous business day.
Values in each commodity tab's non totaling rows (excluding the Line Totals column) can be drilled down to show the supporting transactions by double-clicking on a value in the grid. The drill down displays the transactions and details that make up the grid values.
Unused dispositions and rows can be hidden if need be. To hide the row, press Shift + Ctrl + Alt on the keyboard and double-click on the row itself. To return the rows to their original display, press Shift + Ctrl + Alt on the keyboard and double-click on the Cash column heading. After determining which rows to display, right-click on the heading to see the menu option to Make This Layout My Default.
