World Perspectives
feed-grains soy-oilseeds wheat

CFTC COT Report Analysis

There were really no surprises in this week’s CFTC report, which was delayed one day due to the national day of mourning for President Carter, as funds’ activity matched up with expectations and general market direction. Note that the data, which captures funds’ positions through Tuesday, 7 January, does not reflect the bullish buying spree that has followed the January WASDE. Consequently, the managed money industry and traders in general are certainly more bullish than the numbers here reflect. Funds bought nearly 20,000 futures-only contracts of corn last week and expanded their net long by nearly 9 percent. That matched expectations and put funds long by nearly 250,000 contracts, which ...

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livestock

Early 2026 Projections of Cow-Calf Finances

Key Takeaways: Despite rising cost pressures — including the recent run-up in fuel and energy costs — U.S. cow-calf producers are facing another year of record-breaking revenues and net returns for 2026. Cost pressures — particularly non-feed variable costs — and drough...

Transportation Perspectives - 23 April

WPI has officially launched Transportation Perspectives as a standalone weekly report separate from our Ag Perspectives articles and analysis. Current Ag Perspectives subscribers will have gratis access to the report through 16 April 2026. Please email us or subscr...

feed-grains soy-oilseeds wheat

Market Commentary: Plenty of Risk, Not Enough Conviction

Key Market Insights Markets aren’t trading fundamentals right now—they’re pricing risk. The Middle East remains the center of gravity, and the latest developments point to a situation that is not escalating—but not resolving either. That’s a difficult environment...

livestock

Early 2026 Projections of Cow-Calf Finances

Key Takeaways: Despite rising cost pressures — including the recent run-up in fuel and energy costs — U.S. cow-calf producers are facing another year of record-breaking revenues and net returns for 2026. Cost pressures — particularly non-feed variable costs — and drough...

Transportation Perspectives - 23 April

WPI has officially launched Transportation Perspectives as a standalone weekly report separate from our Ag Perspectives articles and analysis. Current Ag Perspectives subscribers will have gratis access to the report through 16 April 2026. Please email us or subscr...

feed-grains soy-oilseeds wheat

Market Commentary: Plenty of Risk, Not Enough Conviction

Key Market Insights Markets aren’t trading fundamentals right now—they’re pricing risk. The Middle East remains the center of gravity, and the latest developments point to a situation that is not escalating—but not resolving either. That’s a difficult environment...

Functional Dysfunction; Out of the Frying Pan

Functional Dysfunction  Europe has contended that Donald Trump’s attempt to address the decades-long harm caused by Iran’s theocratic regime is “not our war.” The Continent is in an expensive energy crisis because of the Iran war, but moral angst is the only respons...

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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.

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