Dry bulk freight markets rallied this week buyers extending coverage ahead of China’s Golden Week festival in 1-8 October. The rally came partly from an uptick in cargo demand but mostly from vessel supply disruptions stemming from the U.S. fees against Chinese vessels. This is causing Chinese dry-bulk vessel owners to avoid business to and from U.S. ports and tightening the availability of non-Chinese vessels. There is also an unusually large number of vessels loading from Argentina, which suggests China is avoiding not just U.S. soybeans but other products as well. The dynamics of port fees for Chinese vessels and China’s move to avoid booking U.S. ag products will have significant impacts on shipping rates for U.S. firms.&nbs...
What You Need to Know Today: The G7 agreed to release 100 million barrels of crude oil and fuel reserves over four months, with a substantial diesel release front-loaded into the first 20 days. The announcement initially pushed crude oil lower on Friday, although it later recovered a portion o...
In a recent social media post, R-CALF unveiled its latest cattle market plan: “contracts that bind producers before establishing a base price, then tie that price to future negotiated cash transactions, should be prohibited.” That proposal aligns with recent legislation by Represent...
Key Takeaways: The recent pearl-clutching from parts of the beef industry regarding the loss of the daily Kansas fed cattle negotiated trade pricing report is overwrought and ignores the fact that the direction was readily apparent. The shift away from negotiated trade has been well docu...
From WPI Consulting
Accountability and a comprehensive approach to export programming
WPI’s team helped construct a strategic approach to develop, implement, and track promotional activities in 8 key regions across the globe for an agricultural export association. With continued progress measurement and strategic advisory services from WPI, the association has seen its ROI from investments in promotional programming increase by 44 percent over the past 5 years. Not only does this type of holistic approach to organizational strategy provide measurable results to track and analyze, it fosters top-down and bottom-up organizational accountability.