It is not that grain and soy futures markets are on vacation exactly, but in recent days it almost feels that way. One could easily read a book while watching the markets today. The corn market is the only one moving much with the December contract managing a 6-cent range, and it is up 4 cents at last look. That will have to do for today’s excitement as prices of the other markets show little change. Markets are caught between weather forecasts primarily for South America and the daily signals about progress or lack thereof in finalizing Phase One of an agreement to end the trade dispute and tariff war between the U.S. and China. And, those signals are often contradictory. An example occurred this week when Chinese offici...
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.
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...