General Comments Grain and soy markets have plenty of things to chew on these days. On the macro side there is the on again-off again-on again Greek debt relief and bailout saga which, like a Homeric poem, seems never-ending. Then there is the so-called U.S. fiscal cliff that threaten a U.S. economic slowdown if not another recession. When Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid commented today that congressional and White House negotiators were making no progress on a solution to avoid falling off the cliff, U.S. stock markets immediately tumbled.Aside from outside macro matters, grain and soy markets are generating issues of their own to worry traders. Perhaps the most immediate issue concerns the soybean oil futures markets in which funds h...
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.