Although the soy complex and wheat opened lower, there was confidence in the corn number and by late morning most major contracts were in the green, aided by shorts that were selling at the end of the month to book profits. December HRS printed a new contract low today. There was high volume tr...
Readers will likely be familiar with WPI’s work over the past month or so exploring mispricing opportunities in agricultural futures. WPI’s work in this area seeks to identify (for the major agricultural commodities) where along the forward curve current futures prices have the grea...
Dry bulk freight markets continued to strengthen this week, this time with the Supramax and Panamax sectors in the lead. Improved grain demand off the U.S. East Coast and supported values, alongside stronger interest in coal from South America. Baltic coal demand was also said to be &ldqu...
Commodity markets opened mostly in the red but managed a turnaround late in the session for corn, beans and wheat. There was not much fundamentally driving the market. Export sales were solid but there have been no new flash sales reports for several days. By contrast, equity markets opened mix...
Illuminating the value of technical research
On behalf of a commodity producer organization, WPI evaluated the outputs from a project that featured a $5 million investment into technical research over multiple years. WPI’s team captured the results of this extensive effort and synthesized them for presentation to the organization’s governing board; among the findings uncovered and presented for the first time was the development of genomic traits proven, via rigorous testing, to provide crop yield advantages of 50 percent or more to U.S. farmers in times of drought. Capturing measurable results from long-term efforts can be challenging. Educating clients on the dynamics of success measurement when quantifiable results are not readily available requires deep client-consultant collaboration and an ability to consider both near- and long-term client aspirations with market/policy dynamics – attributes that WPI brings to every consulting engagement.