The good news: lumber prices have continued to fall. The cash price for a thousand board feet fell last week to $472 according to Fastmarkets Random Lengths, as reported by Fortune.

But check the futures price at Nasdaq and it's just over $530. The discrepancy is because of differing time horizons. The cash price mentioned by Fastmarkets is the current price for shipment in the next two weeks, according to Mike Wisnefski, CEO of online commodities marketplace MaterialsXchange. "Futures represents the price of a railcar that is shipping sometime from September 15th to September 30th," Wisnefski tells GlobeSt.com.

"From years of experience, it is difficult to say why futures prices are where they are," Wisnefski continues. "So many different parties are involved and each one has its own unique set of circumstances that they are dealing with."

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