The staff at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) continues to watch their long ball knocked foul. Budget Outtakes Some observations on other parts of the Obama administration's proposed budget for FY 2015:No Green Friend: President Obama is pushing his environmental agenda and brought John Podesta back into the White House to ensure its success. Yet, the president's budget proposes cutting EPA's budget by $300 million. This would be the fifth straight year in which the environment agency's funding was decreased. Most prior cuts were made to enforcement, but the president this time proposes reducing support for clean water. EPA does get to administer a newly proposed Climate Resilience Fund, which is a resignation that we are p...
What You Need to Know Today: Commodities were mostly lower across the board today after yesterday’s Federal Reserve meeting hinted at a potential interest rate hike later in 2026. The dollar index reached its highest level in over a year, and a strong dollar makes U.S. agricultural expor...
Tomorrow is the Juneteenth federal holiday, and the USDA, along with the rest of the federal government and the CME, will be closed, so the monthly Cattle on Feed report was released a day early. The total number of cattle on feed in feedlots with 1,000 head or more capacity on 1 June amounted...
From WPI Consulting
Forecasting developments in production agriculture
On behalf of a private U.S. agricultural technology provider, WPI’s team generated an econometric model to forecast the movement of concentrated corn production north and west from the traditional U.S. Corn Belt. WPI’s model has subsequently provided quantitative support to a multi-million-dollar investment into short-season corn variety development. WPI’s methodology included a series of interviews with regional grain elevators and seed consultants. Emphasizing outreach and communication with stakeholders who possess intimate sectoral knowledge – on-the-ground insights – is a regular component of WPI’s methodologies, made possible by WPI’s ever-growing network of industry contacts.