Launched 3 and a half years ago during the 2007 Bull Market in Everything, DBA is essentially a basket of agricultural commodities, like wheat, corn, cocoa, sugar, soybeans and even lean hogs. These are held in the form of futures contracts which are continuously rolled over. The ETF basically allows stock investors to potentially benefit from any rise in the prices of these farm products without having to actually buy land, bring in a harvest and go to market (or learn to trade futures).