The Market If traders were nervous headed into the three-day Memorial Day weekend, concerns appeared to be to the upside. The lack of demand had soybean prices falling but this week saw a turnaround that was untimely for speculators. They had spent last week creating a net short position in soybeans of 4,688 contracts. (Note that on a disaggregated basis, managed money still had a tiny net long in soybeans of 710 contracts.) This week’s rally forced a lot of short-covering. For the week, July soybeans added 2.3 percent, July soyoil was up 3.2 percent, and July soymeal lost 1.6 percent in value. It is important to note that the largest increase was for old crop soybeans where supplies are tight. November soybeans added 17.25 ce...
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.