Helios offers two types of recurring Global Commodity Reports: Weekly Reports and Monthly Reports. While both are designed to keep you informed about market conditions, they serve different purposes and cover different types of commodities.
This guide explains what the reports have in common, how they differ, and when to use each one.
TLDR: Weekly and monthly reports are built on the same analytical foundation, but they serve different needs.
Weekly reports are short-term, signal-driven, and futures-focused
Monthly reports are seasonal, contextual, and planning-focused
Together, they provide a complete picture of how climate, pricing, and market dynamics evolve across different time horizons.
What Both Reports Have in Common
Despite their different cadences and audiences, weekly and monthly reports share a common goal: helping you quickly understand what is happening in the market and where to focus your attention next.
Shared characteristics
Both weekly and monthly reports:
Are delivered automatically by email to subscribed users
Are commodity-specific (one report per commodity)
Include climate risk analysis using Helios’ WA%R methodology
Cover multiple countries, prioritized by market share
Highlight key risks, trends, and notable changes
Include curated commodity-specific news
End with definitions and FAQs to help interpret the data
Are summaries, not full replacements for the platform
In both reports, you’ll also find links or clear guidance to explore deeper data directly in the Helios platform when something stands out.
Key Differences at a Glance
Dimension | Weekly Reports | Monthly Reports |
Commodity type | Exchange-traded commodities | Standard (non-exchange-traded) commodities |
Examples | Coffee, cocoa, soy, wheat | Fruits, vegetables, grains, oilseeds |
Delivery cadence | Weekly (Mondays, except holidays) | Monthly |
Primary focus | Futures markets and short-term signals | Seasonal trends and medium-term outlook |
Futures prices | Included | Not included |
Climate risk window | Short-term (2–3 weeks) | Broader (30 days to full season) |
Time sensitivity | High | Moderate |
Typical use case | Active monitoring and trading | Strategic planning and sourcing |
Weekly Reports: Purpose and Focus
Weekly Global Commodity Reports are designed for exchange-traded commodities, where prices can move quickly, and markets respond to short-term signals.
What weekly reports emphasize
Weekly reports focus on:
Futures prices and closing prices
Helios trading recommendations (bullish, bearish, neutral)
Short-term climate risk as a leading indicator
Week-over-week price changes
Near-term forecasts (weeks to a few months)
Acute events such as disasters or disruptions
Climate risk is shown over shorter windows (typically the past two weeks and the next two weeks) to capture rapid changes that may influence futures markets.
Because these reports come out weekly, they are designed to surface:
Momentum shifts
Emerging risks
Signal changes that may warrant immediate attention
Who weekly reports are best for
Weekly reports are especially useful for:
Commodity Traders
Risk managers
Teams monitoring futures exposure
Anyone who needs near-real-time awareness of market movement
Monthly Reports: Purpose and Focus
Monthly Global Commodity Reports are designed for standard commodities that are not traded on exchanges and typically move more slowly.
What monthly reports emphasize
Monthly reports focus on:
Seasonal climate risk and yield implications
Medium-term price trends and forecasts (when available)
Growing season performance
Comparisons to historical averages
Broader market and supply context
Climate risk analysis in monthly reports spans:
The past 30 days
The upcoming 30 days
Or the full growing season, depending on context
This makes monthly reports better suited for understanding:
How a season is progressing overall
Whether risk is unusually high or low compared to history
When the most critical parts of the season occur
Who monthly reports are best for
Monthly reports are especially useful for:
Procurement teams
Strategic sourcing
Planning and budgeting
Stakeholders who need a regular, but not daily, market update
Differences in Pricing Coverage
Weekly reports
Always include futures prices (show rolling futures contracts)
Pair futures prices with climate risk (WA%R) to highlight lead–lag relationships
Include Helios trading recommendations and explanations
Also includes everything a monthly report would cover regarding cash prices
Monthly reports
Do not include futures prices
Focus on cash prices (export, wholesale, or farmgate) when available
Emphasize price direction and seasonal behavior rather than short-term movement
Provide longer forecast horizons without trading signals
Differences in Climate Risk Analysis
Both reports use the same underlying climate risk methodology, but they present it differently.
Weekly climate risk
Short windows (2–3 weeks)
Emphasis on spikes, volatility, and near-term drivers
Useful for identifying event-driven risk
Often tied directly to futures signals
Monthly climate risk
Broader windows (30 days to full season)
Emphasis on seasonal performance
Focus on averages versus historical norms
Useful for understanding yield and supply implications
Country-Level Detail
Both reports include country-level sections, but the depth and framing differ.
Weekly country pages
Weekly price movements
Week-over-week changes
Short-term forecast updates
Climate risk broken down by week
Regional risk snapshots for near-term monitoring
Monthly country pages
Year-over-year and seasonal price context
Monthly climate risk summaries
Identification of the riskiest part of the season
Comparisons to past seasons
Broader narrative explanations
How to Use the Reports Together
For users subscribed to both exchange-traded and standard commodities, weekly and monthly reports work best when used together.
A practical approach:
Use weekly reports to monitor fast-moving signals and near-term risk
Use monthly reports to understand season health and medium-term direction
Treat weekly reports as an early-warning system
Treat monthly reports as a strategic checkpoint
When something stands out in either report, the next step is typically to:
Open the Helios platform for deeper charts and drilldowns, or
Ask a follow-up question using Helios Horizon