The weekend moves by Western governments to remove Russia from the SWIFT international payment system have effectively ended grain trade from the Black Sea. Russian firms are no longer able to access credit or other financial services and traders are washing out any bookings of Russian grain. Concurrently, Ukraine’s navy planted mines around its seaports to prevent Russian vessels from landing, a move that further blocks any potential of grain exports from the country. Russia and Ukraine’s grain supplies are now inaccessible via the Black Sea, though Russian grain could continue to move into China. WPI estimates that Ukraine and Russia have, respectively, 8 and 6 MMT of wheat left to export through the 2021/22 campaign. Collecti...
What You Need to Know Today: There has already been a strong run of flash soybean sales announcements in recent weeks, but more than 1.4 MMT reported this morning is an exceptionally large single-day total with major implications for the market. If the sales to China and unknown destinations w...
On Friday, at 6:57 AM, President Donald Trump announced, via a social media post, a 90-day window during which up to 300,000 metric tons of product for ground beef could be imported outside of tariff-rate quotas—a move aimed at bringing down costs for American consumers. This is the secon...
From WPI Consulting
Weighing in on strategic realignment
WPI’s team was retained by the governing board of a U.S. industry organization to review a decision, reached by vote, to invest significant assets into the development and management of an export trading company. WPI’s team conducted a formal review of this decision and concluded that the current level of market saturation would limit the benefits of the investment. Based on WPI’s analysis and recommended actions, the board subsequently reversed its decision and undertook a strategic planning effort to identify more impactful investments. On behalf of numerous clients, WPI has not only assisted in identifying strategic paths but also advised their implementation.