World Perspectives

Capital Investment and Productivity

While much of the focus on Europe relates to political instability in the EU, and threats from Russia, there are ample economic issues that also need to be addressed. This is true in both industrial production and agricultural output. European farms continue to lag their American counterparts in total factor productivity due to less R&D spending, slower technology uptake, smaller farm sizes, and regulatory burdens. The latter, including the Green Deal and Farm to Fork prompted a political revolt by farmers that is still reverberating across the Continent.  But European industrial production is similarly burdened. McKinsey studied EU investment and productivity and found large deficiencies. U.S. investment in intellectual property...

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feed-grains soy-oilseeds wheat

Market Commentary: Weather Overrides Trade Deal; Cattle Hit New Highs on Tight Inventories

The big news for Monday’s ag market trade wasn’t the U.S.-EU trade deal, but rather continued favorable weather in the U.S. Midwest that will boost corn and soybean yield potential to record or near-record levels. The weather has private analysts boosting yield expectations by sever...

Humiliating; Keep Your Enemies Close; Contradicting

Humiliating U.S. trade talks with China this week are not expected to net anything more than an extension of the current standoff, which means nothing for U.S. soybean exporters. Meanwhile, the trade agreement yesterday between President Trump and EU President Ursua von der Leyen offers up many...

WPI Transportation Report

Dy Bulk Markets  Again this week, the bullish story is the rapid rise in Capesize vessel freight values with demand for Australian iron ore driving most of the rally. The Aussies have seen strong demand for August shipments in particular, which is pushing the forward end of the curve highe...

feed-grains soy-oilseeds wheat

Market Commentary: Weather Overrides Trade Deal; Cattle Hit New Highs on Tight Inventories

The big news for Monday’s ag market trade wasn’t the U.S.-EU trade deal, but rather continued favorable weather in the U.S. Midwest that will boost corn and soybean yield potential to record or near-record levels. The weather has private analysts boosting yield expectations by sever...

Humiliating; Keep Your Enemies Close; Contradicting

Humiliating U.S. trade talks with China this week are not expected to net anything more than an extension of the current standoff, which means nothing for U.S. soybean exporters. Meanwhile, the trade agreement yesterday between President Trump and EU President Ursua von der Leyen offers up many...

WPI Transportation Report

Dy Bulk Markets  Again this week, the bullish story is the rapid rise in Capesize vessel freight values with demand for Australian iron ore driving most of the rally. The Aussies have seen strong demand for August shipments in particular, which is pushing the forward end of the curve highe...

feed-grains soy-oilseeds wheat

Further Identification of Mispricing in Ag Futures

WPI offers the following analysis as a continuation of last week’s work examining mispricing opportunities in agricultural futures. Readers may recall that this work seeks to identify for the major agricultural commodities where along the forward curve current futures have the greatest er...

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From WPI Consulting

Forecasting developments in production agriculture

On behalf of a private U.S. agricultural technology provider, WPI’s team generated an econometric model to forecast the movement of concentrated corn production north and west from the traditional U.S. Corn Belt. WPI’s model has subsequently provided quantitative support to a multi-million-dollar investment into short-season corn variety development. WPI’s methodology included a series of interviews with regional grain elevators and seed consultants. Emphasizing outreach and communication with stakeholders who possess intimate sectoral knowledge – on-the-ground insights – is a regular component of WPI’s methodologies, made possible by WPI’s ever-growing network of industry contacts.

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