It is always difficult to trade grain and soy futures based on politics and political rhetoric, and this truism is proving itself once again. Markets were lower yesterday on discouraging comments from various sources about the state of U.S.-Chinese negotiations. They were then buoyed early today by comments from President Trump’s economic advisor Larry Kudlow that those negotiations are on track and progress is being made ahead of next week’s formal meeting with Vice-Premier Lui He and his delegation. Understandably, markets have become heavily invested in the outcome of this meeting, perhaps to the exclusion of a few other important factors like unfavorable Brazilian weather forecasts. One unsubstantiated rumor in the air is t...
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.