As trading of agricultural crop futures contracts evolved in the 19th century at the Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT), there were futures markets for wheat, corn, oats, rye and hay. In the 20th century, trading in the hay and rye markets diminished so much that the CBOT eventually dropped them. However, emergence of soybeans as a major crop prompted the CBOT to create futures contracts for soybeans, soymeal and soyoil, which attracted enough trading volume to become very successful. Grain exchanges in Kansas City and Minneapolis then used those as models when they created futures contracts for the specific classes of wheat commonly produced in their geographic areas. Trading volume for Kansas City and Minneapolis wheat futures contracts was re...
What You Need to Know Today: Traders are increasingly focused on next Wednesday’s August WASDE report, with corn and soybean yield estimates expected to drive the next major move in grain markets. Recent crop condition declines and late-July heat have increased uncertainty around USDA&rs...
Yesterday the Senate Agriculture Committee held its markup of the “skinny” farm bill, and it was derailed over Democratic opposition to plans for imposing food stamp costs on state governments. The Democrats pushed back on a provision that required states to pick up a larger share o...
Key Takeaways: WPI’s 2025/26 corn export models continue to reflect strong international demand and put the total marketing year volume slightly above USDA’s estimates. Strong old crop corn exports are offset by weaker feed and residual use, leaving ending stocks slightly ele...
From WPI Consulting
Communicating importance of value-added products
Facing increasing pressure to quantify the value of export promotion efforts to investors, a U.S. industry organization retained WPI to develop a quantitative model that better communicated the importance of exports. The resulting model concluded that value-added meat exports contributed $0.45 cents per bushel to the price of corn, increasing support for that sector’s financial support of WPI’s client. In addition to serving the red meat industry with this type of analysis, WPI has generated similar deliverables for the U.S. soybean and poultry/egg industries.