The Federal Reserve held interest rates steady on Thursday, indicating that it considers it has crossed the finish line in its effort to rein in inflation. The federal funds rate was held at an effective 5.375, the midpoint between 5.25 and 5.5 percent. Earlier this week, the November inflation rate was reported to be up .01 percent over October, and up 3.1 percent in November 2023 over November 2022. The CPI was held down by a drop in energy prices of 5.4 percent year-over-year, but food prices were up 2.9 percent. Of course, the “core” inflation rate that the Fed watches excludes food and energy because of their volatility. Thus, the core inflation rate year-over-year came in at 4 percent – which is still about do...
The U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) enters its mandated six-year review on 1 July. The original intent of the review is outlined in Article 34.7, which obligates members to: Provide recommendations and decide on appropriate actions. Extend the USMCA for another 16 years and meet aga...
Key Market Insights Geopolitical Limbo: Geopolitical risk remained a key driver across global commodity markets today. President Trump stated that the Iran memorandum of understanding is not yet final and warned that military action could resume if negotiations fail. Both sides continue w...
Key Takeaways: Drought remains a major threat to global agricultural production, particularly in regions with limited rainfall and growing water scarcity. Commercially available drought-tolerant traits in corn, soybeans, and wheat have generally delivered modest yield improvements, limiting th...
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.