The CBOT and U.S. stocks both seemed ready to rally in early trade on Tuesday and both markets broadly marked strong gains in the morning. By early afternoon, however, U.S. stocks had pared gains and fallen into negative territory, and that weakness and a continued “risk off” attitude pushed the CBOT lower. There was little fresh fundamental news for the grain markets, which may have been part of the problem. The major “story” themes of a strong dollar, slow exports, and good harvest weather were again factors for the CBOT and none of them offered much bullish support. Wheat futures managed to post some 13-cents of gains for the day and was one of the few ag markets to end higher. Notably, cattle and hog futures coll...
What You Need to Know Today: The corn and soybean markets closed slightly higher in low-volume trade. The wheat market was mixed, with HRW continuing its downward trek on improved moisture. As expected, the bearish cattle on feed report drove down cattle prices and pulled hogs down with it. Mi...
Monday, 25 May is a U.S. holiday, and both the markets and our office will be closed. Please note that the next issue of Ag Perspectives will be published on Tuesday, 26 May. The WPI staff wishes everyone a safe and enjoyable holiday weekend...
USDA’s monthly cattle on feed report was released today. The total number of cattle on feed in feedlots with 1,000 head or more capacity amounted to 11.6 million head, 102 percent of last year. Source: USDA, WPI Placements were up, but part of that is attributable to persistent drought c...
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.