A candy manufacturer needs to buy a large quantity of cocoa to make chocolates for February 14, which it will make and ship to stores in December, 2021. Assume that she considers hedging with coca futures in April, 2021 owing to the speculative nature of cocoa prices.
What is her hedging strategy and how would she execute it?
Explain in detail, step by step.
Be specific about dates, provide example scenarios of price changes.
Looking up the characteristics (weight measure, volume, price levels) for cocoa contracts will be very helpful in this task.