Grain, soybean and soymeal prices weakened in moderate overnight trading, and that carried over to the day session. In the absence of fresh inputs to direct prices, markets are moving in a very short-term up and down pattern within long established trading ranges. General Comments The Federal Reserve Bank ended its Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meeting by leaving the interest rate at near zero, unchanged since December 2008 when the U.S. was plunging into recession. This was as expected. In the statement released after the meeting, however, the Fed seemed to go out of its way to emphasize that a rate increase was very much on the table at the next FOMC meeting in December. It also indicated that it was now less concerned about the...
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.