The supply side of the 2017/18 U.S supply/demand balance is being molded by crop production prospects. However, the demand side is being fashioned by quite a number of factors.A wise old grain trader once observed many years ago that “crops always get planted.” He was right back then and still is today. Every spring, grain and soy markets have a tendency to obsess over each weather-related delay that appears to threaten the timely planting of the U.S. corn and soybean crops, and there have been plenty of opportunities to do so this year. Weather systems dropping very heavy rains have marched with regularity across the Plains, Mid-South and the entire Corn Belt. Flooding has been severe in many areas, washing out previously planted fields an...
What You Need to Know Today: Russia rejected calls for a ceasefire in the Black Sea, including a proposal to halt attacks on civilian shipping that could help restore grain flows from Ukrainian ports. Tyson Foods announced plans to permanently close its Joslin, Illinois, beef processing facili...
The big news in the cattle markets yesterday was Tyson Foods’ move to close two more beef plants. One of them, the Joslin, Illinois, plant was shuttered immediately after the announcement. The other, in Eagle Mountain, Utah, is a case-ready plant that does not slaughter cattle. Tyson also...
The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) released the Consumer Price Index (CPI) on Wednesday. In July, the CPI rose 0.1 percent, seasonally adjusted, and rose 3.4 percent over the last 12 months, not seasonally adjusted. The index for all items less food and energy, or the “core” infla...
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.