Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's government has been battling deflation and appears to be making some headway, based on its latest release of statistic...

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Huge U.S. Soymeal Export Sales Last Week The USDA weekly export sales report that was released yesterday was notable for the huge weekly amount of soymeal...

U.S. corn exports deviation from historic patterns has implications for what exports will be in the rest of the marketing year. Analysis of unshipped corn...

Changing Eating Habits – New Entrants in Business Although the share of GDP from basic agriculture is falling, that of animal production within agriculture...

Meat Opportunity At least one major company has announced that as a result of Washington's harsh approach to country of origin labeling (COOL), it no longe...

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General Comments Today's USDA's weekly shutdown-delayed export sales report covered the week that ended 3 October. Traders and analysts were looking forwar...

Some economists have theorized that there is a common thread in terms of national agricultural policies among countries as their economies transition throu...

Catching Up With the extended federal government shutdown, livestock marketing statistics are catching back up and the markets that rely on them for transp...

Russian Grain Markets: 16-22 October 2013 Harvesting Updates As of 21 October, grain and leguminous crops were harvested on 39.7 million hectares, 90.2 per...

General Comments Starting with overnight trade, it was a rally day for grain and soybean futures with prices reaching impressive gains at their peak. CME w...

Throwing Mud Animal agriculture groups are defending their constituency against a report by John Hopkins Center for a Liveable Future that claims public po...

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Wheat Egyptian tenders have historically been a good way to measure the competitiveness of wheat from different global origins. Assuming that condition con...

Coming into the 2012 Farm Bill, there was one sure consensus among producers and the lawmakers who crafted the bill – crop insurance was to be its cornerst...

From late June-August of 1972, officials of Exportkhleb, the Soviet Union's government grain trading agency, traveled to New York and Washington, DC where...

General Comments The U.S. Labor Department announced that the U.S. added fewer jobs during September than analysts expected – 148,000 versus 193,000 in Aug...

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  News Updates With the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region closed for the Eid holidays last week, new developments in the grain business have...

Huge Soybean Export Inspections Last Week The U.S. soybean harvest may have been a bit later than normal this year, but U.S. exports are clearly catching u...

Brinksmanship occurs when an event is pushed to the verge of potentially devastating losses in hopes of achieving an advantageous outcome. Washington recen...

Data Users' Angst This year's USDA Data Users meeting was dominated by the impacts of the government shutdown. Private industry analysts were anxious to le...

Now that the government has reopened, Congressional Budget Committee Chairmen Senator Patty Murray (D-Washington) and Representative Paul Ryan (R-Wisconsin...

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Milling Wheat The Black Sea market has made a spectacular rally during the last week, because of the lack of farmer selling and overbooked port capacity fo...

General Comments Markets were steady to higher overnight, led by soybean futures. That trend continued in this morning's session, but wheat lost its gains...

2013 Grains and Oilseeds Production Estimates China National Grain & Oil Information Center (CNGOIC) released its estimate of the country's 2013 grains...

We tend to always focus on the major crops of wheat, corn and soybeans. Most analysts do that because those are the crops that have futures markets. They d...

In the movie "Groundhog Day," actor Bill Murray's character gets caught in a time warp and wakes up in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania on that day, facing the s...

Increased Minimum Support Price for Grains Next Season While the Ministry of Agriculture has recommended an increase in the Minimum Support Price (MSP) of...

The domestic and export soybean basis remain strong and, in fact, have been strengthening throughout this harvest. There are several reasons: The old cro...

CETA Implications Canada and the EU completed a trade agreement, the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA), with both impacts on their bilatera...

General Comments It was a catch-up day for USDA today. It did announce some soybean export sales this morning of 220,000 MT to China and 140,000 MT to unkn...

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Slaughter Estimates While the federal government is shut down and the Ag Marketing Service reports are unavailable, below is our estimate of cattle and hog...

Paraguay President Vetoes Export Taxes on Soybeans, Corn and Wheat The President of Argentina today vetoed the legislation passed by the congress that woul...

General Comments The U.S. government, including USDA, reopened today following the passage of the interim legislation to temporarily fund the government an...

The CFTC announced yesterday that J.P. Morgan Chase has agreed to pay a fine of $100 million related to the activities of one of its derivative trading des...

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South American Soybean Market Developments The few old-crop soybeans in South America are being retained by Argentine farmers as a protective hedge against...

General Comments Facing the risk that the government's cash flow will turn negative tomorrow (17 October) and threats that the U.S. credit rating could be...

Don't Get Fooled Again The corn market took a brief dive on a report that Mexico would ban imports of biotech corn, but it shouldn't have even blinked once...

Russian Grain Markets: 9-15 October 2013 Harvesting Updates As of 14 October, grain and leguminous crops were harvested on 38 million hectares, 86.3 percen...

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Before the government shutdown, the rollout of Obamacare and the Treasury Department being on the brink of exceeding its borrowing authority under the debt...

We wrote yesterday that the House passed two resolutions instructing conferees to: Seek the repeal of the sugar program. Support a Senate amendment to li...

Big USDA Soybean Inspections Last Week The Federal Grain Inspection Service (FGIS) reported today that 47.381 million bushels (1.29 MMT) of soybeans were i...

Bittman Helps Big Ag Mark Bittman at the New York Times is hypercritical of industrial agriculture, but his latest rant promises it a bright future. Bittma...

General Comments In the absence of much in the way of fresh news, overnight trading was mixed and light in volume with wheat still struggling against last...

News Updates MEDITERRANEAN/MIDDLE EAST COMMENTS Syria is said to be having some success with its plans to pay for grain imports using blocked funds in fore...

As we all know too well, the government shutdown continues to block nearly all of USDA's daily, weekly and monthly reports. We suppose it requires a shutdo...

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The federal government is still closed, but the farm bill conference has finally started. As we reported on 11 October, the House cleared the way to appoin...

Golden Week Invigorates the Economy China's Ministry of Commerce (MOC) announced on 8 October that the national retail and catering sector sales revenue re...

If you live in farm country, every other radio and television ad is about selling planting seeds for 2014. This must seem terribly early for those who don'...

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General Comments Markets were mixed overnight, with soybeans holding gains and the initial strength in wheat losing ground by early morning. Corn was basic...

Fama Analysis on USDA The Nobel prize just won by Eugene Fama, Lars Peter Hansen and Robert Shiller has an important relationship to the current lack of US...

General Comments Corn and soybean markets were quite weak today and there weren't many good reasons why. Here is some of today's market chatter: Concerns...

Effects of Excess Rainfall Per the Indian Meteorological Department (IMD), the entire country received 106 percent of its Long Period Average (LPA) rainfal...

President Obama met with a group of House Republicans on Thursday and Senate Republicans this morning. The agenda for both meetings was how to reopen the g...

It is a rare occasion when farmers should actually hope that prices collapse, but that's exactly what they should be hoping for in the month of October. Th...

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Rich and Sugar Targeted The House voted to go to conference with the Senate over the 2013 Farm Bill, and on Saturday will consider explicit instructions to...

In terms of the 2013 U.S. grain and soy harvests and what they may mean for supply and demand balances, most of the analytical attention seems to be focuse...

Slaughter Estimates While the federal government is shut down and the Ag Marketing Service reports are unavailable, below is our estimate of cattle and bee...

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TTIP Dance EU Trade Commissioner Karel de Gucht tried to reassure Europeans that the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) will not worsen...

Paraguay Approves 10 Percent Export Tax on Soybeans, Corn and Wheat Paraguay's Chamber of Deputies yesterday approved a 10 percent export tax on soybeans,...

General Comments The lack of market information from USDA and the trading position of large speculators are creating an unrepeatable buying opportunity for...

Middle East Food and Demographics Countries in the Middle East/North Africa (MENA) region vary greatly in size of population, agricultural resources and fo...

General Comments Grain and soy futures played on both sides of Tuesday's closes without much in the way of direction during overnight trading and again dur...

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Russian Grain Markets: 2-8 October 2013 Harvesting Updates: As of 8 October, grain and leguminous crops were harvested on 36.9 million hectares, 83.8 perce...

Ethanol Reduction The ethanol industry has been under attack on Capitol Hill and now it is reported that U.S. EPA will propose cutting the corn ethanol ble...

Corn The Argentine corn crop is not starting off well due to inadequate soil moisture in most of the core areas due to lack of rain that is delaying planti...

  News Updates While the exact dates will vary by country, it appears that Eid Al Adha will begin on either 14 or 15 October. Most private companies w...

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The tactical standoff between the Democratic-controlled Senate and the Republican-controlled House continued into today. The Senate held a vote on requirin...

Record Canadian Canola Crop Statistics Canada sharply increased its forecast on Friday for that country's 2013 canola crop. It raised its forecast from 14...

Ministers meeting in Bali on the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade negotiations made a very strong and hopeful statement that negotiators would "now pr...

There was a great deal of pressure put on the 2013/14 U.S. corn crop. The severe Midwestern drought and heat wave during the summer of 2012 was devastating...

General Comments Stronger Chinese futures markets and still-circulating rumors that China bought as much as 800,000 MT of U.S. corn gave some impetus to a...

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Negotiation Similarity If one wanted to see the divide between Washington politicians over the budget in another context, one can just read about trade neg...

The U.S. government shutdown is now entering its second week. It is a symptom of the inability of Congress and the administration to come to terms on a fed...

One of the interesting sideshows of the U.S. government shutdown is its impact on the agricultural futures markets. It's interesting because there's no way...

Milling Wheat The rains in Eastern Europe have finally stopped and the winter grain plantings in Ukraine and Russia have resumed. Last week, the planted ar...

General Comments We started week number two of the U.S. government shutdown today with no indication that any solution is near. That means at least several...

General Comments Markets were mixed in the overnight trade and for the first few hours of trade today. Corn and soybeans turned higher after Informa's late...

It shouldn't be a surprise to anyone who knows how to use a calculator that net farm income in 2013 and 2014 will likely be well below the record levels of...

Updating NAFTA Major companies in the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) countries have written the three political leaders (Obama, Harper and Pen...

New Support Price and Strengthening Rupee Affect Corn Exports With the rupee strengthening by approximately 8.84 percent within a 30-day period (67.71 rupe...

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Shutdown As both parties attempt to shift blame on the federal government shutdown, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Virginia) is considering going bac...

In a wide variety of ways, USDA affects and influences producers of grains, oilseeds, livestock, poultry and eggs, cotton, wool, sugar, fruits, vegetables,...

Federal Government Shutdown to Impact Livestock Trading This is day three of the federal government shutdown. There is no information released from USDA fo...

General Comments Looking at the unbroken array of green numbered closes on our screen, one might think that something was going on. Unusually, every contra...

Grand Bargain Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nevada) gave the first public signal of where the current crisis in Washington is headed – toward the gr...

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Korea Buys Soymeal Korean feed millers have been on a soymeal buying spree this week. On Monday, Korea's Feed Leaders Committee (FLC) bought 80,000 MT of s...

Weather There was some rainfall during the past few days. Unfortunately, it was below what farmers were expecting and what was really needed. However, the...

General Comments Note: As a result of the government shutdown, most, if not all, of USDA's regular reports will be suspended until the shutdown ends. This...

Russian Grain Markets: 24 September–1 October 2013 Harvesting Updates As of 26 September, grain and leguminous crops were harvested on 34.2 million hectare...

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Korea TPP Ho-hum South Korea will soon announce its intentions to join the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) negotiations. Seoul reportedly believes the step...

Grain market analysts eagerly await each USDA quarterly report on grain and soybean stocks. Analysts can study industry trends and such consumption data as...

General Comments Markets continue to react to yesterday's USDA quarterly stocks and final small grains reports. Long liquidation by non-commercial soybean...

  News Updates MEDITERRANEAN/MIDDLE EAST COMMENTS The World Food Program (WFP) has delivered 22,000 MT of U.S. milling wheat to Lebanon and Turkey for...

Today's date is 1 October 2013. The nine-month extension of the Food Energy and Conservation Act ended yesterday, 30 September 2013, with the end of the fi...

Low on Totem Pole Congressional Republicans will try all kinds of approaches to the government shutdown in an attempt to shift pressure back on to their op...

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China's Growing Soybean Imports Have Curtailed Rest of World's Imports The most important factor impacting the global soybean market in recent years has be...

Policy Drip Torture Congressional Republicans are now offering a one-week clean extension of federal funding, purportedly to allow time for negotiations wi...

Milling Wheat The Black Sea market is firmer following the rally of U.S. and EU wheat. Despite the price increase, Russian and Ukrainian wheat remains the...

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China's Overseas Agricultural Investment Continues to Expand The large state-owned agricultural enterprise Xinjiang Production & Construction Corps (XP...

USDA's quarterly stocks report was bearish for corn and soybeans and slightly friendly for wheat. The table below shows the report numbers compared to a ye...

General Comments It was actually a more active market through the first half of the trading session than expected, considering we were waiting for the USDA...

The House and Senate were engaged in their last legislative volleys today over the continuing resolution (CR) intended to keep the government in operation...

USDA will release its quarterly stocks and final small grains production estimates at 11 AM (CDT) Monday, 30 September. We have commented on the quarterly...

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General Comments Grain and oilseed markets were generally quiet in light to moderate trade ahead of Monday's USDA quarterly stocks and final small grains p...

Earlier this week, EPA expanded the definition of heating oil under the renewable fuel standards (RFS). This rule comes under EISA's "additional renewable...

First Food Grain Production Estimates The key production areas are likely to produce more grain this year as a result of the continuing good monsoon. The f...

Nice Talk President Barack Obama hosted a meeting today with Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and the post script is that each talked nicely. U.S. trad...

Ukraine Firms Denies China Land Purchase Article A news report out of China this week indicated that a Chinese firm, Xinjiang Production and Construction C...

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Bali Disagreement No, there is not one yet. In fact, apparently there are still 400+ bracketed sections of the draft ministerial statement for the 9th WTO...

General Comments In the absence of any fresh market moving inputs, grain and soy markets seemed to be in a consolidative mood today. Corn futures traded on...

Global poultry consumption is expected to hit 106 MMT this year, up from 91 MMT in 2009 and 66.4 MMT in 2000. In Asia, poultry consumption was 24.4 MMT in...

An anniversary of a dubious sort occurred last week. It was five years ago, on 15 September 2008, that Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy. The collapse o...

EU Sends Hope for Farm Bill The EU's latest iteration of the Common Agricultural Policy started with a public debate over three years ago. U.S. Congression...

Corn Local offers in the free aside shipment (FAS) market are approximately ARS 900 ($156/MT) and farmer selling below that is nil. Some consumers are payi...

General Comments It was the wheat market's day. Wheat futures were up as much as 17-18 cents at their highs, in a move that began during the overnight sess...

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Russian Grain Markets: 18-24 September 2013 Harvesting Updates As of 23 September, grain and leguminous crops were harvested on 33.4 million hectares, 72.3...

The Senate Agriculture Committee today called on the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) to look at the trading of Renewable Identification Numbers...

This week, I have been in Rotterdam, Netherlands attending and making a presentation at a protein conference. The attendees were mostly from European food...

TPA Fight President Obama has finally told Congress that he wants the Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) that will enable an expedited and amendment-limiting...

On 30 September, USDA/NASS will release its survey-based estimates of U.S. grain and soybean stocks as of 1 September. Since 31 August was the end of the s...

General Comments The overnight e-session saw prices for the grains and soybeans trade modestly higher as prices crawled back up off yesterday's lows. Howev...

  News Updates MEDITERRANEAN/MIDDLE EAST COMMENTS Iraq, a major importer of both wheat and wheat flour, is now expecting its best crop ever. However,...

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We handicapped the political outlook for the new farm bill last Friday. Provided below is a brief procedural overview of what has to occur to get the farm...

Milling Wheat The Black Sea market was mostly unchanged without significant activity. The Russian government has not yet announced the timing and the volum...

General Comments Markets opened weaker Sunday evening on expectations that the pace of the corn and soybean harvests will start to increase this week. Corn...

Activists have pressed for stronger action by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (USFDA) to slow the use of antibiotics in animal agriculture. A key arg...

The markets appear to be temporarily trapped in a no man's zone of market-making or breaking news. Consider: Temperatures across the U.S. crop production...

China GMO Fight Continues 12 lawyers from four provinces in China recently signed a joint letter to the China Food and Drug Administration (CFDA) and the M...

Organic Brouhaha At least four activist groups have charged that USDA guts national organic law. The agency purportedly changed the process by which otherw...

There is a widely-shared consensus that agricultural markets will continue to face the challenge of matching ever-growing demand with increased production...

General Comments It was a black and blue Friday for equity and commodity markets with both trading lower to sharply lower. CNBC reported today that more mo...

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India's Food Inflation According to Consumer Price Index (CPI) calculations, retail inflation eased slightly to 9.52 percent for August 2013 from 9.64 perc...

We predicted on 17 September that the Republican nutrition-only title of the farm bill would squeak by the House this week. Yesterday, the House did indeed...

There are really only two short-term issues left for the market to deal with over the next month or two. This is assuming that while there will certainly b...

General Comments Yesterday's Fed announcement that it would not cut back its monthly bond buying program at this time surprised many Fed watchers. Fed offi...

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Shrinking Beef Supplies USDA releases the Cattle on Feed report tomorrow, and the consensus expectation is for numbers to be down – again. The total number...

A Big Week for U.S. Soybean Export Sales This has been a very big week for U.S. soybean export sales. Yesterday, USDA announced that U.S. exporters had rep...

Political Success A testy vote today on food stamp spending started with a partisan vote on the rule itself and will likely go down from there. By contrast...

In varying degrees, world grain and oilseed markets have been forced to deal with concerns raised by tight supplies, or at least perceptions of tight suppl...

Fresh Licenses Didn't Activate Argentine Corn Market The Argentine government decided to release 3 MMT of licenses for the old crop corn, and market partic...

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TPP Disappointment U.S. business representatives are concerned that the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) negotiations are headed toward a less than ambitiou...

General Comments In a mild surprise, the Fed's Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) decided not to ease back its quantitative easing (QE) program of buying...

Russian Grain Markets: 11-17 September 2013 Harvesting Updates As of 16 September, grain and leguminous crops were harvested on 31.8 million hectares, 69.1...

Much of the fate of the 2013 farm bill comes down to the disposition of the House Republican leadership's proposal for food stamps, officially named the Su...

General Comments USDA's Farm Service Agency (FAS) released its acreage data collected from farm program compliance and crop insurance at 5 AM EDT, in time...

  News Updates MEDITERRANEAN/MIDDLE EAST COMMENTS Hodeidah, a major port city in Yemen, will undergo an expansion and modernization program that is es...

A lot of Uncertainty about U.S. Soybean Yields I have been in the Quad Cities area of Illinois and Iowa this week, attending a conference organized by the...

Saps in Negotiations The U.S. is being overly conciliatory toward the G-33 and their demand for a food security exemption to WTO agriculture disciplines. T...

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Early this morning, USDA's Farm Service Agency (FSA) released preliminary data on U.S. acreage planted, abandoned and prevented from being planted. The bas...

Commodity Analytics shows the most recent data for grain export sales and shipments along with historic patterns. Current deviations from historic norms po...

China's Livestock Industry May Take over Crop Farming by 2015 The China Academy of Engineering (CAE) recently released the results of its study on sustaina...

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According to the majority leader's calendar, the House will start votes Tuesday evening in order to dispose of a number of items before moving to the nutri...

General Comments Weekend rain across a good portion of the dry western Corn Belt forced the soy complex lower Sunday evening, and those losses became signi...

Milling Wheat The Black Sea market remained unchanged last week. Prices have been stable since July. Exporters are not pressing the market too aggressively...

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The market is already talking about the potential for another record soybean crop in Brazil, months before it will be planted. That assumption is based on...

The European Parliament voted earlier this week to reduce the target for biofuels from 10 percent to 6 percent by primarily cutting back on food crops as b...

Simple Sugars Multinational financial services companies have a lot of expertise, but complex public policy issues deserve more robust analysis than the Cr...

General Comments After digesting USDA's data for a night, there seemed to be a conclusion that yesterday's 40 cent run-up in November soybeans was a little...

Economy Stalled Due to Slow Domestic Demand CRISIL, the global analytical company, has reduced the 2013/14 GDP growth estimate to 4.8 percent from the 5.5...

WASDE Projections The September World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates Report (WASDE) was released this morning. It projected production growth for...

Ag as Microcosm Changes in U.S. farm size over recent years has witnessed an increase in the number of large, very profitable operations and an increase in...

Recall that soybean futures were trading below $6.00 per bushel in the fall of 2006. Within about two years, soybean contracts had rallied about $10 per bu...

USDA Cuts U.S. Soy Yield, Production, Crush, Exports and Carryout Stocks USDA reduced its forecast as expected for the U.S. soybean crop in today's supply...

General Comments Today's price action was all about the contents of USDA's WASDE report, and it was made evident that large speculative traders w...

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Russian Grain Markets: 4-10 September 2013 Harvesting Updates As of 6 September, grain and leguminous crops were harvested on 27.6 million hectares, 60 per...

Argentine Crops The needed rains did not arrive in the northern area of Argentina, where the present lack of moisture remains critical. The expected storm...

No Secrets A side show in the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) debate is news that America's National Security Agency (NSA) has pursue...

General Comments Wheat contracts started off this morning with a bounce higher, while the soybean complex and corn contracts were rather sedate for a major...

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General Comments Capital preservation can sometimes be observed in trade activity, and that seemed somewhat apparent today as positions are adjusted prior...

The state of the economy has a significant impact on food consumption, especially expenditures for food consumed at home versus away from home (restaurants...

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  The Enemy is Us Misperceptions about the agrifood sector are frustrating to everyone and understanding the cause is a huge social science endeavor...

Dry Weather Also a Problem in Brazil and Argentina The U.S. soybean crop would appear to be shrinking every day that the hot, dry weather continues across...

Speculative traders are much more at liberty to focus on the short-term than are hedgers of commodities, producers or end-users. That is because survival o...

  News Updates MEDITERRANEAN/MIDDLE EAST COMMENTS Saudi Arabia has announced that the upcoming Eid Al-Adha holiday will start on 10 October with the g...

Congress returns to session this week and there are only nine legislative days on the calendar. The rise of the debate over the proper foreign policy respo...

Extreme Weather Affects China's Major Ag Commodities It has been a tough summer for China with floods in the north and northeast as well as high temperatur...

USDA will release its September crop production estimates and WASDE this Thursday at 12:00pm EDT/11:00am CDT. The August drought across most of the western...

General Comments Markets had a firmer tone to open the session Sunday evening with soybeans again leading prices somewhat higher. The expected weekend rain...

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Milling Wheat The Black Sea market is steady without much pressure from farmers and exporters. Russia is expected to export 16 MMT of wheat in 2013/14 (5 M...

Russia Saves Washington President Obama's Syria policy may have been rescued by Russia, which has proposed international oversight of the chemical weapons...

General Comments Markets were mixed overnight and also started the day that way. Corn and wheat traded higher most of the session with November soybeans tr...

Band-Aids Promoted Countries continue to meet in Geneva in an effort to find agreement on the food security proposal from the G33 developing countries. The...

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Crop Revenue Insurance The initial price calculation period for the 2014 U.S. winter wheat crop insurance program started on 15 August and runs through 14...

General Comments Markets were mixed overnight and also started the day that way. Corn and wheat traded higher most of the session with November soybeans tr...

Food Security Bill – Two Sides of the Coin The Indian Parliament passed the National Food Security Bill (FSB) this week. It will become law once it is sign...

EPA has sent the 2014 Required Volume Obligations (RVO) rule to the Office of Management and Budget for review. This rule establishes how much ethanol and...

Regulatory Harmonization U.S. and European leaders made a public commitment this week to a high-standard, comprehensive TransAtlantic Trade and Investment...

General Comments Weather model runs are consistent in picturing rain for the Northern Plains and parts of the Midwest from 8-11 September. North Dakota and...

During the nearly five years since he was elected, it has been interesting, to say the least, to compare President Obama's approach toward the domestic pol...

China Sells 83 Percent of Soybean Reserve Stock Offering China's Sinograins sold 417,448 MT of soybeans today from its reserve stocks, which amounted to 82...

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Ruling on Smithfield/Counter Offer The U.S. Committee for Foreign Investment in the U.S. (CFIUS) could rule as soon as tomorrow on the Shuanghui Internatio...

Wheat Market Brazilian millers were in the market this week to buy Argentine wheat as the Free Aside Shipment (FAS) market is heating up. Exporters paid $2...

Farm Bill Extension Steve Kopperud of the government relations firm Policy Directions Inc. correctly opines that President Obama teeing up the Syria war re...

A number of developments are brewing in the biofuels sector. Below is a look at each: Sugar to Ethanol The Feedstock Flexibility Program (FFP) was complete...

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General Comments What would a market week be without a turnaround Tuesday, even if it falls on Wednesday due to the holiday on Monday? The fact that today...

Russian Grain Markets: 29 August – 3 September 3 2013 Harvesting Updates As of 2 September, grain and leguminous crops were harvested on 25.8 million hecta...

In terms of actual weather conditions and temperature readings, it has been a relatively mild summer in Washington, DC. Temperatures have averaged well bel...

  News Updates MEDITERRANEAN/MIDDLE EAST COMMENTS The U.S. export business to Morocco for both soymeal and soyoil faces a great deal of competition th...

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TTIP Hype European proponents of the TransAtlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) are sounding like salesmen with their hype that TTIP is the sing...

General Comments Export grain inspections for the week ending 29 August were strong for wheat and corn, but soybean inspections were slim. Wheat's volume c...

Weekend Rainfall Insufficient to Stem Soybean Losses Rainfall was received in the Midwest over the weekend, but the amounts and coverage were insufficient...

In Japan, the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) is straddling a rough course between defending its key farm constituency from overseas competition and...

Worst Performance by Indian Currency within BRICS and Economic Doom India's rupee is the worst performer out of all of the BRICS countries (Brazil, Russia,...

The U.S. soybean outlook has turned from bearish to bullish over the past 30 days because soybean yields across the western Corn Belt have been reduced by...

General Comments Soybeans led the market lower overnight and pushed prices back into the gap that higher openings created last Monday. Not much has changed...

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On Wednesday night of this week, ethanol mills that were interested in buying surplus sugar under the Feedstock Flexibility Program (FFP) were required to...

Lanworth Reduces its Forecast for U.S. Soybean and Corn Production Lanworth, the crop forecaster subsidiary of Thomson Reuters, yesterday reduced its forec...

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General Comments Overnight trade in grains and the soy complex saw prices chop around without much direction. Trading volume was moderate but well below th...

Livestock Producer Data Collection Issue Arises Again Back in February of this year, we reported that EPA had been collecting data on confined animal feedi...

Indonesia's Palm Oil Plays Oilseed competitors in western countries have extensively used disparagement to slow the palm oil tsunami out of Southeast Asia...

Aren't weather markets fun? For the third year in a row, the U.S. crop production has been bedeviled by various kinds and combinations of adverse weather r...

General Comments Overnight trade saw more short covering and mostly firmer prices in response to what were seen as unfavorable weather forecasts – no break...

Argentina: Farmer Selling for Campaign 2013/14 Farmer selling in Argentina is completely delayed compared with other origins such as Brazil and to the past...

Russian Grain Market: 21-28 August 2013 Harvesting Updates As of August 26, grain and leguminous crops were harvested on 23.5 million hectares (3.4 million...

TPP Nut-Cracking The political commitment to complete the TransPacific Partnership (TPP) negotiations this year brings forward the various tough issues. Th...

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  News Updates MEDITERRANEAN/MIDDLE EAST COMMENTS This year's Syrian wheat harvest is reported to be the best in a decade despite the country's curren...

Coalescing Silliness The ethanol companies coalesced and developed a McCarthy-like strategy to demand an investigation of the oil companies for coalescing...

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Indonesian Government Rejects Proposal to Eliminate Soybean Import Tariff Today, the Indonesian government rejected a proposal by its Minister of Trade to...

To state the obvious, corn and soy futures markets reacted to the flash drought with a vigorous weather premium rally that peaked yesterday, then paused to...

Congress has about one week of legislative days to pass a continuing resolution (CR) for funding the federal government when it returns. To date, there hav...

General Comments After corn and soy futures prices jumped so sharply yesterday in the haste to price in the risks of the late season drought and this week'...

WPI has written about the declining state of the U.S. soybean crop for several weeks. Our concerns started when crop observers reported that soybean pod co...

China's Domestic Rapeseed Meal Price Hikes amid Low Supply China's rapeseed meal prices continued to rise the week of 19 August and reached $522.88-$555.55...

Ben Bernanke's term as chairman of the Federal Reserve is to end on 31 January 2014 and all indications are that President Obama will nominate a new chairm...

General Comments The Pro Farmer tour's corn and soybean production estimates were below the USDA August WASDE estimates and that, coupled with the extended...

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The Pro Farm crop tour was completed this week and the results were interpreted as bullish for soybeans and bearish for corn. The bullish soybean story is...

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Rupee Nose Dives; Economy in Critical Condition The declining value of the rupee is having an apparent effect on the economy. It has lost 20 percent of its...

General Comments Soybeans led markets higher overnight and then exploded higher after 9:30 this morning. It has been an interesting week in the soy complex...

As we reported on 6 August, EPA announced the 2013 required volume obligations (RVO) under the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) – albeit eight months late. RV...

President Obama signed the Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act on 22 July 2010. Known simply as Dodd-Frank after its principal authors, Senator...

Renewable Energy Fallacy Proponents of renewable energy remain hopeful but frustrated, after decades of work and investment, that the alternative to petrol...

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General Comments The up-down-up-down pattern of futures market price action continued with both corn and soybeans reversing yesterday's rally. Late though...

Cattle and Beef Supply In short, cattle are down and beef is up. The National Ag Statistics Service released the monthly cold storage report today. It show...

Canadian Canola Crop Forecast Below Expectations, But Still a Record Statistics Canada released its production forecast yesterday for Canada's main crops...

Soybeans Brazil reacted quickly to the weakness of the real which dropped from 2.25 to 2.4 reals/USD and the rise of CBOT levels. Farmers sold large quanti...

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  News Updates MEDITERRANEAN AND MIDDLE EAST COMMENTS The Pakistani government is very seriously considering the possibility of reducing the 6 percent...

Deutsche Bank has issued a report highlighting the additional cost of non-tariff barriers. For example, while EU food exporters face average U.S. tariffs o...

General Comments Corn and soy futures prices continued the down one day and up the next pattern of recent days. Traders are parsing every weather model run...

Tight Cottonseed Supplies Forecasted Again for MY 2013/14 MY 2013/14 is shaping up to be another bad one for U.S. cottonseed processors if USDA's forecasts...

Russian Grain Market: 15-20 August 2013 Harvesting Updates Grain and leguminous crops were harvested on 17.7 million hectares (3.4 million hectares less th...

General Comments Following yesterday's sharp jump in grain and soy futures prices, a Turnaround Tuesday sort of consolidation seemed almost inevitable. Sti...

In many respects, the U.S. wheat year of 2013/14 will be a strange one. Much of the hard red winter (HRW) crop was planted in drought conditions last fall...

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As we have reported on both 6 August and 13 August, EPA is finalizing rules for the 2014 required volume obligations (RVO) for biofuels, and there is much...

While Congress is on its August recess – or sometimes referred to as district work sessions break – there is much focus on the farm bill. Lawmakers have be...

General Comments Markets opened stronger than expected Sunday evening led by soybeans that started out 10 to 15 cents higher. Soybeans quite quickly moved...

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Wrong Turn on Supply Controls We noted back on 12 August how French egg farmers were grousing about heavy financial losses as their Dutch counterparts were...

Milling Wheat The Black Sea harvest pressure seems to be over. Farmers' selling has decreased significantly as the majority of the winter wheat has already...

Chinese Government's Seed Industry Concerns Chinese industry and government officials recently showed concern about the nation's seed industry crisis, and...

July is corn's month because that's when pollination takes place. August is soybean's month because that's when blooming and pod setting take place. This y...

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We reported on 29 July that the final rule for the long anticipated Feedstock Flexibility Program (FFP) was announced. The FFP is intended to avoid sugar l...

Soybean export sales in this week's USDA report totaled 1.9 MMT. That ranks as one of the top five weeks in history and exceeded only a few times back in 2...

General Comments Markets started the evening session firm but what little strength there was gradually eroded to small losses and little action throughout...

Capital Controls for Stemming Rupee Devaluation and Economic Glide The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) imposed partial capital control on companies and individ...

Sucks at Supplicating Michael Needham of the conservative policy advocacy group Heritage Action says Congress should extend the 2008 Farm Bill for another...

Big New Crop Soybean Sales Last Week Today's USDA export sales report showed U.S. exporters made exceptionally large new crop soybean sales last week. The...

General Comments The color theme for grain and soy complex futures today was firmly green. Prices began to move higher overnight as trading volume picked u...

Constituent Service? Credit John McCormick and Greg Giroux over at Bloomberg for revealing a delicious irony in the food stamp debate. They analyzed USDA d...

Proof of Principle for In Vitro Burger Professor Mark Post of Maastricht University in the Netherlands served a hamburger last week in London that was cult...

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Recall that the bearish 28 June Acre report caused a sharp sell-off in the December corn contract; down to about $4.90 per bushel. End-users found that to...

Conflicting Food Safety Rules Trade negotiators in the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) and Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) negotiatio...

General Comments The smaller estimated U.S. corn yield and production in Monday's WASDE kicked corn futures prices higher. By Tuesday, doubts about USDA's...

Russian Grain Market: 8-14 August 2013 Harvesting Updates As of 12 August, grain and leguminous crops were harvested on 16.7 million hectares (3.7 million...

MARKETS Recent weakness of the real and the bounce in CBOT soybeans produced a good volume of farmer selling. On Tuesday it was estimated that about 1.5 MM...

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What's in the Beef Over the years, the popular restaurant chain Chipotle has aired commercials denigrating factory farms while promoting an image of its fa...

As we wrote on 6 August, EPA issued its 2013 required volume obligations (RVOs) for biofuels under the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) and notified the marke...

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Well! Those U.S. corn and soybean production estimates from USDA/NASS contained in yesterday's August WASDE provided another instance to show that we in th...

General Comments Yesterday's lower crop yield and production estimates caught a bearishly oversold futures market leaning in the wrong direction which led...

  News Updates MEDITERRANEAN AND MIDDLE EAST COMMENTS The Iraqi Ministry of Trade has announced that the current wheat stocks on hand are sufficient t...

USDA Makes Questionable Cut in Forecasted U.S. Soybean Yield Yesterday's USDA crop production report surprised a lot of analysts by making a substantial cu...

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Surprises are surprises because they happen when you least expect them to happen. So it was with today's August USDA WASDE report. Here's what happened in...

Market Quips A selection of recent comments in the meeting rooms of Washington... NSA Spying: During a conference call about implementation of the Dodd-F...

General Comments Corn and wheat markets were sluggish overnight while soybeans exhibited some strength based on disappointing rains over the weekend across...

Location, location, location. That's the name of the game in real estate and also in commodities. It's all about the basis. This is especially true about U...

China Explores Professional Farmer Training The Chinese government recently initiated the nationwide concept of professional farmers and is starting to exp...

Milling Wheat The Black Sea market remained about unchanged last week. The Ukrainian and Russian harvest is proceeding in favorable weather conditions. The...

Clients may recall the disruptive regional dairy policy known as the Northeast Interstate Dairy Compact (NEIDC) which was in place from 1996- 2002. If not,...

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General Comments Soybeans benefited from some residual buying overnight following yesterday's strong close, but that buying barely lasted until daylight wh...

India's Oil Meal Exports Down, Iran Remains Biggest Buyer India's oil meal exports contracted by 24.26 percent to 1.027 MMT in the first four months (April...

Yesterday afternoon a private analytical group released their estimate of U.S. corn and soybean production. The corn number was slightly above the USDA Jul...

Vilsack's Threat USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack issued a clever, even if flawed threat by saying USDA would not be able to make full or continuing compensation...

A Lot of Poor Mouths to Feed in Next Decade There will be more mouths to feed in the future but many will reside in the poorest countries and where governa...

Sizable New Crop Soy Export Sales, Soymeal Sale to China Today's export sales report from USDA continued the trend of recent weeks of very small old crop e...

General Comments Monday's important WASDE looms over the markets, but it was not the only factor in play today. Cash markets, export sales and weather all...

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Beef Cattle and DDGS Demand Last week, Livestock Roundup covered the topic of beef production which was the lowest 1 July beef herd since at least 1973 and...

As we have commented before, USDA's August WASDE is always notable because it contains the first crop yield and production estimates for U.S. corn and soyb...

Reports and Open Trading Hours Now that USDA reports are being released during open trading hours, it is clear that there is a spike in both volatility and...

USDA's Report Poltergeist First, it should be emphasized that USDA is as frustrated as the trade over the increased variance since 2007 in the trade's pre-...

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Major Concern about Impact of Excess Rainfall on Indian Soybean Crop I was in Mumbai, India at the end of last week to attend and make a presentation at a...

Argentine 2014 Crop Low Production Margins Argentine farmers have seen their historically best economical situation in the past 10 years despite the 35 per...

General Comments Overnight trading in corn and soybeans saw prices move higher while wheat traded on both sides without much direction. The day session fou...

Russian Grain Market: 1-7 August 2013 Harvesting Updates As of 5 August, grain and leguminous crops were harvested on 14.1 million hectares. The volume of...

EPA announced the 2013 Required Volume Obligations (RVO) under the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) today. The RVOs set the minimum amount of biofuels that mu...

General Comments Grain and soy futures edged lower overnight mostly in response to the slightly improved weekly crop condition report for corn and soybeans...

  News Updates MEDITERRANEAN/MIDDLE EAST COMMENTS The Bangladesh government intends to import another 850,000 MT of wheat this fiscal year and expects...

As of last Sunday, 4 August, USDA's weekly crop condition report rated 64 percent of the U.S. corn crop as being good/excellent. This was up 1 percent from...

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General Comments According to some accounts, over 40 percent of the U.S. crop-growing regions received moisture over this past weekend. The problem was tha...

The farm bill isn't the only thing facing a 30 September deadline; so is the whole government. Congress has 12 appropriations bills to pass to fund the gov...

Milling Wheat Black Sea harvest pressure seems to have stopped for the moment with prices a bit firmer. Russia's crop may be slightly smaller than the 50-5...

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We are still quite a way from harvesting the 2013 U.S. corn and soybean crops, but if the early private crop production estimates are anyplace close to the...

China's Alfalfa Imports Continue to Grow China's January-June 2013 alfalfa imports reached 319,500 MT, a nearly 63 percent increase year on year, according...

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Virginia) is working on a new version of the nutrition part of the farm bill to be sent to conference with the Senate...

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Bountiful Monsoon Brings Bumper Paddy Crop Expectation The 2013/14 crop area under paddy is estimated at 19.638 million hectares against last year's 18.424...

Wasteful Figures The UK is challenging a European Commission goal of halving food waste by 2020, which is claimed to be 89 million tons annually. Part of t...

General Comments A private crop production forecast released after the close yesterday pegged the U.S. corn crop at 13.993 billion bushels and the U.S. soy...

Yesterday afternoon a private analytical group released their estimate of U.S. corn and soybean production. The corn number was slightly above the USDA Jul...

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Malaysians Upset with France over Palm Oil Treatment Malaysia's government and palm oil industry are quite upset with efforts by some in the French governm...

Summer Beef Production Spiking; 2014 to See Record Beef Prices U.S. beef production will reach a 21-year low according to the U.S. Department of Agricultur...

Still No Silver Bullet Banning 16-ounce soft drinks, vending machines and fried foods in schools as well as the mandatory posting of unhealthful and dense...

General Comments Yesterday's tepid attempt at price recovery quickly got buried by persistent selling by funds. Some of the selling was in response to tech...

Last week we made note of two events of importance to American agriculture that took place 50 years ago in 1963.  One was the referendum in which U.S...

South American Corn Empty For Spot Shipments Argentine origin is running out of export licenses so most of the local players are out of the market. Due to...

  EU COOL Pre-Study Results The European Commission has ordered a study to evaluate the impacts of a proposed intra-EU origin labeling requirement on...

General Comments The overnight session for grains and the soy complex traded quietly but in fair volume on both sides of unchanged. It seemed as though the...

Russian Grain Market: 25-30 July 2013 Harvesting Updates As of 30 July, grain and leguminous crops were harvested on 12.6 million hectares. The volume of t...

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Soybean Crop Condition Down Slightly, Still Good Yesterday's USDA crop progress and condition report indicated there was a 1 percent drop in the combined g...

EPA Beats USDA Newly installed EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy said today, "We need to cut carbon pollution to grow jobs." In essence, the administration's...

  NEWS UPDATES MEDITERRANEAN/MIDDLE EAST COMMENTS Iraq is considering the possibility of importing French wheat in the regular wheat tenders. It norma...

General Comments Markets seemed to pause overnight and even tried a modest rally in an effort to assess what may be in store for grains and the complex as...

A few years of relatively high corn prices have encouraged farmers around the world to increase corn production and for a change it appears that reasonably...

The Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City has recently reported on an interesting trend in agriculture lending: the market share of agricultural loans shifte...

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General Comments It was really just more of the same today. Corn and soybean markets were again weak on softness in old crop basis and weather forecasts th...

Many farmers from other parts of the world have spent time visiting U.S. farms over the years. Rarely does this happen without these visitors staring in aw...

More Damaged Wheat to Be Downgraded China's wheat crop damage is more severe than previously estimated because of the frost and rain during the growing per...

The House Energy and Commerce Committee has been moving steadily ahead this year toward considering reform of the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS). A series o...

Milling Wheat The Black Sea market remained under pressure last week, as the Russian and Ukrainian harvests are progressing under favorable weather conditi...

Fourth Agricultural Production Estimates: Higher Production and Higher Prices India has produced more food grains than the target as well as more wheat, co...

Sizable Old-Crop Soybean and Soymeal Export Sales This week's USDA export sales report showed sizable sales of soybeans and soymeal for shipment in 2012/13...

USDA today announced two actions to intervene in the sugar market and avoid loan forfeitures: one was a second purchase of raw cane sugar to be offered for...

Reciprocity with Japan Cars and wheat should be treated equally. Toru Hisazome, a deputy director in Japan's Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisherie...

It was just last Monday that the August/November soybean futures spread set its high for the year at $2.32. Basis levels for both soybeans and soymeal were...

WPI provides a summary of the week's futures price activity and the gains/losses experiences by grain, oilseed, and livestock markets. Additionally, today'...

General Comments The markets took a much deserved vacation today with prices trading both sides of unchanged in moderate volume. It is reported that tradit...

Meat and Livestock View of RFS The Energy and Power subcommittee of the House Energy and Commerce Committee held the first of what will be many hearings on...

Grain and soy prices, be they futures prices, cash basis levels or a combination of both, are tied closely to crop prospects as viewed by those who trade f...

General CommentsThe corn and soy markets continued to sink into a bath of red ink, with enough of it splattering out on wheat to pull those markets down as...

Don't Cry for Geneva Pascal Lamy gave his farewell speech as he departs after nearly eight years of service as the WTO's director general. His departure me...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

Soybean Pricing Dynamics Despite the common belief that Chinese soybean needs are primarily covered for August and September, there is still interest being...

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General Comments Rumors continue to swirl concerning a possible decision by Chinese authorities to sell up to 3 MMT of soybeans from the government's reser...

RUSSIAN GRAIN MARKET: 17-23 July 2013 Harvesting Updates As of 22 July, grain crops were harvested on 10.3 million hectares. The volume of the grain produc...

SNAP – Heal Thyself U.S. aggies may rue the day that they acceded to House leaders the segregation of farm supports (500,000 beneficiary farms; 120,000 lar...

WTO Risk of Farm Bill Both the Senate- and House-passed farm bills end direct payments, which are considered green box neutral under WTO rules, and instead...

  News Updates MEDITERRANEAN/MIDDLE EAST COMMENTS The trade is full of stories again this week concerning the wheat for electricity deal between Pakis...

The Energy and Power subcommittee of the House Energy and Commerce Committee held the first of two marathon hearings on the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) t...

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Argentine Farmers Holding Back Soybean Sales Argentina's farmers have been very reluctant to sell their crop because of high export taxes and a very low of...

The outlook for U.S. wheat has been plagued by negatives of one sort or another for several years. One of the negatives has been falling and/or stagnant pr...

General Comments Weather markets are notoriously fickle. Old crop/new crop inverses are treacherous especially as the actual time spread before the availab...

Downturn in China's Feed Sales China's feed sales were lower in the first half of July compared to the same period in June. Hog feed consumption is down by...

The second quarter (April-May-June) initial Gross Domestic Product report will be out 31 July. The US economy grew at 1.1 percent in the fourth quarter of...

Congressional Hearing Winners and Losers A House Energy and Commerce subcommittee is the scene this week for what is being called a slugfest amongst all th...

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Virtually every weather forecaster and computer model run were putting big rains across all of the western Corn Belt last Friday. The problem was that over...

Milling Wheat The Black Sea market remained unchanged from last week, with demand increasing at the current price level. Farmers are currently reluctant to...

General Comments The widespread rains that were supposed to cover the western Corn Belt missed. That should have meant much stronger openings Sunday evenin...

Credit Exposure Squeezed to Help Rupee There is widespread concern about the fate that awaits the Indian rupee as it hurtles in free fall. The Reserve...

There isn't much fresh to talk about these days other than weather and potential U.S. corn and soybean yields. That is certainly a lot and, of course, extr...

Sour Grapes Outgoing WTO Director General Pascal Lamy has many good qualities but he showed his sour side this week. He complained about the big bilateral...

House Agriculture Committee Chairman Frank Lucas (R-Oklahoma) sent a memo entitled "Next Steps on 2013 Farm Bill" to the members of the committee on Tuesda...

The December corn contract traded below $5.00 per bushel several times this week, but each day it was able to close with its nose just above the $5.00 surf...

WPI provides a summary of the week's futures price activity and the gains/losses experiences by grain, oilseed, and livestock markets. Additionally, today'...

General Comments Weather is what it is all about for the next several weeks and today's forecasts remained consistent with rain expected across much of the...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

When Will New Soybean Yield Plateau Be Achieved? As someone who has been involved in the soybean sector for more than 30 years I have long been interested...

Later this year, on 22 November to be precise, the 50th anniversary of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy will be remembered. On that date in 1...

Pork Expansion in Fourth Quarter According to the most recent USDA Quarterly Hogs and Pigs report, March-May farrowings totaled 2.921 million litters, more...

General Comments The elimination of price premiums, added to the value of corn and soybean futures over the last two weeks as protection against the risk o...

Bears and Policy Although the discussion at a Kansas City Fed conference was framed as the shifting nexus in agriculture, it boiled down to how bearish sho...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

General Comments The ongoing dispute between the EU and GFS weather models was tempered overnight when the latest EU model run shifted from its previous ho...

Paraguay is Becoming a Big Commodity Player Paraguay is incorporating better technology in their farm practices and the results are evident as the producti...

RUSSIAN GRAIN MARKET: 10-16 July 2013 Harvesting Updates As of 15 July, grain crops were harvested on 7.8 million hectares. The volume of the grain produce...

News Updates MEDITERRANEAN/MIDDLE EAST COMMENTS Massive overuse of antibiotics in the poultry industry in Africa and the Middle East is the major cause for...

It is mid-July which is usually the beginning of the "dog days of summer" in the U.S. The July WASDE has come and gone with the expected lack of major surp...

General Comments The decline in corn and soybean weekly crop ratings gave a firm tone to overnight grain and soy trading activity aided by the early EU wea...

Large June NOPA Soy Crush Reaffirms Need for Price Rationing NOPA's crush report of yesterday indicated members crushed 119.05 million bushels of soybeans...

A plethora of hot topics are on tap at a hearing tomorrow before the U.S. Senate Agriculture Committee on re-authorization of the Commodity Futures Trading...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has scored the House farm bill as saving just more than $11 billion over 10 years.  That is about $7 billion les...

Strong Precipitation Could Affect Corn Crops Crop growth in northern China's corn belt could be negatively impacted by the recent continuous rain. Most of...

The crops are planted and doing quite well by most accounts.They are simply very late. There is no dome of doom in the immediate forecasts. Significant por...

Since the House passed its farm-program-only version of the farm bill: Senate Assistant Majority Leader Dick Durbin (D-Illinois) has stated that the Hous...

General Comments Markets started the Sunday evening session slightly lower. That was expected following Friday's massive sell-off in soybeans and corn. The...

Milling Wheat The Black Sea market remained unchanged from last week. The mood is still bearish and the buyers/consumers of the main Mediterranean importin...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

Alternative Energy Roughhouse It was a smash-up week for alternative energy with more contradictory studies flying, legislative paring and mealy mouthed be...

USDA reports always keep you up at night and yesterday's numbers were no different. Here are a few items worth noting: U.S. hard red winter wheat (H...

WPI provides a summary of the week's futures price activity and the gains/losses experiences by grain, oilseed, and livestock markets. Additionally, today'...

Wrong Moves Could Lead to Market Discrepancies Why would the Indian Ministry of Agriculture and Food want to hike import duties on pulses from a rate of ze...

General Comments Markets were mixed overnight, but corn and soybeans turned decidedly bearish when they re-opened at 8:30 this morning. Evidently, the trad...

The House passed the farm-only bill yesterday as Gary Blumenthal reported. It needed 218 votes to pass, but the Speaker's chair gaveled the vote closed to...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

U.S. corn ending stocks for the current 2012/13 season (ending 31 August) were 729 million bushels. This figure was a reduction below USDA's June estimate...

Boehner Salvages Farm Bill Critics excoriated it, Democrats voted against it and President Obama made a grandstanding veto threat against it, but U.S House...

U.S. Industry Joins Canadians in COOL Lawsuit A group of eight industry groups from the U.S. and Canada have filed a lawsuit in Washington D.C. The groups...

USDA released their July WASDE and Production reports at noon today and they offered no decisive advantage to either long or short traders. Slight adjustme...

Net Reductions in U.S. Soybean and Soyoil Export Sales Today's USDA export sales report indicated a net reduction in U.S. export sales of soybeans and soyo...

Russian Grain Market: 3 July – 9 July 2013 Harvesting Updates According to the Russian Federation's Ministry of Agriculture, as of 3 July grain crops were...

Figuring U.S. Foreign Policy Bangladesh has a predominantly Muslim population of nearly 200 million people living on around $2,000 per capita of income per...

General Comments It is the day before USDA's July WASDE, but it is the weather that continues to grip the market's attention. The high pressure ridge setti...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

Renting Lands Becomes A Difficult Business Tight margins, higher costs, increasing tax pressure and bad results in the past two campaigns makes this busine...

General Comments Short covering, fund buying and old crop/new crop spread action were the dominant features of grain and soy markets today. Overnight tradi...

Traders in commodity futures markets are always nervous, it goes with the territory. They are always fearful that something unforeseen will happen to harm...

News Updates MEDITERRANEAN AND MIDDLE EAST COMMENTS This week there were quite a few comments in the press and from various organizations on the grain situ...

Former baseball great Yogi Berra, oft quoted for his malapropisms, once said, "if you come to a fork in the road, take it." That appears to be what the Hou...

Brazil Slightly Increases 2013 Soybean Crop Estimate The Brazilian commodity supply agency (Conab) today raised its forecast for the 2013 crop of soybeans...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

China Revising Supportive Procurement Policy for Grains China is revising its 10-year-old supportive procurement policy for grains. The new policy is expec...

General Comments Markets came back from the long weekend in a slightly better mood following Friday's sharply lower trade with a holiday-shortened thin tra...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

Milling Wheat The Black Sea wheat market is under pressure because of the ongoing harvest and slow demand. The crop in Russia has been revised slightly dow...

As we reported on 25 June, ethanol in Brazil is now cheaper than gasoline and that is creating a demand for ethanol. The latest data shows that the price o...

In a normal summer, the 4 July holiday in the U.S. can be a significant time for the markets. It is especially true for corn, because in a normal summer a...

General Comments Markets were closed for the holiday yesterday and opened at 8:30 this morning. Early calls were for lower openings, but the markets opened...

WPI provides a summary of the week's futures price activity and the gains/losses experiences by grain, oilseed, and livestock markets. Additionally, today'...

Yesterday, the Independence Day holiday, was a key milestone of the summer driving season. Driving mileage typically increases in the summer season from Me...

Indian Rupee Had Worst Regional Performance The Indian rupee (INR) had the worst performance in the region over the past 90 days with a depreciation rate o...

We've been following weather and crop planting in North Dakota for the past month because it has been so wet, especially across the northern third of the s...

Spying Versus Observing President Obama rebuffed charges of U.S. spying on European missions for leverage in the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partner...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

General Comments There has been market discussion that China is making some selective wheat purchases to shore up stocks. USDA currently estimates that Chi...

Parana River Vessel Groundings Last week was quite problematic for vessels on the Parana River. Two vessels collided on the river, followed by the groundin...

Russian Grain Market: 26 June – 2 July 2013 Harvesting Updates As of 1 July, grain crops were harvested on 2.3 million hectares. The volume of the grain pr...

Historically, a poultry producer could potentially risk a 20 percent increase in feed prices when corn was trading at $2.40/bushel, but a similar proportio...

News Updates MEDITERRANEAN and MIDDLE EAST COMMENTS The Syrian government grain purchasing department (Hoboob) has reported that it purchased 550,000 MT of...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

Argentina Selling Soymeal Corn Blend in Vietnam According to a contact, Argentine exporters are offering a product in Vietnam that is called a balanced soy...

Horsemeat and Raw Milk USDA is allowing liberty in the marketplace by approving a New Mexico plant to move forward with the legal slaughter of horsemeat fo...

General Comments Technical traders who observed the gap lower in December corn on Monday attempted to drive the contract down even more, but punching a hol...

There has been a lot of commentary about the Fed hinting at phasing down quantitative easing (QE) since last week, when the Fed acknowledged it may be cons...

Threats and Other Silliness No threats, just opportunities. There are alternative ways to think about many things, including those perceived as threats. Th...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

General Comments Peculiar dynamics in commodity markets can sometimes stand out as red flags. The sole rally in the July corn contract last Friday was note...

Agricultural Product Logistics Continuing Growth Despite Logistic Sector Slowdown The China Federation of Logistics and Purchasing (CFLP) recently reported...

Milling Wheat The Black Sea wheat market is under pressure as the harvest is progressing and demand remains slow. Russian/Ukrainian wheat is the most compe...

CAP/Farm Bill; Similarities and Differences Tracking the similarities and differences between U.S. and European farm policy is a herky-jerky affair. The tr...

We reported on Friday that House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Virginia) is actively pursuing a plan to separate farm programs and nutrition programs into...

Increased MSP to Boost Planting and Inflation Increased monsoon activity ensured that farmers planted their crops in time. The government had raised the mi...

Today was the big day for USDA Acreage and Grain Stocks reports, and "big" was the operative word for acreage. Corn, soybeans and wheat were all up, with c...