Here’s our monthly look at how the various Commodity ETFs are stacking up against the commodities they are supposed to track. Typically (as in, 99.9% of the time), we’d just tell you to read ’em and weep, but as you’ll notice below, futures actually underperformed long-only corn ETF (CORN). Why? The commodity ETFs typically trade within the closest three months of a contract, and in grains, the beginning of the year tends to see more price tension in the closer contracts (read: those relying on the most recent crop) than those further out- like the December 2012 contract this regular post follows. So for now, you can expect to see some short-term victory for CORN, but as our final scorecard from last year demonstrated, victories like that are usually only enjoyed momentarily.

NOW you can read ’em and weep.