Futures were higher overnight after the Wall Street Journal reported that China had agreed to purchase $70 billion of U.S. energy and agriculture products. Once again, this amounted to a “buy the rumor, sell the fact” situation, and corn and soybean futures turned lower this afternoon. The Chinese offer was conditional on the U.S. cancelling last week’s new tariffs, and the White House has not yet released a statement (or tweet) about the situation. President Trump announced today the abandonment of an overhaul of the U.S. renewable fuels policies. Under pressure from farm-state lawmakers, the administration scrapped plans to modify the Renewable Fuel Standard program, which would have benefited oil companies. Renewable I...
What You Need to Know Today: President Trump suspended the planned attacks on Iran and announced that the pieces for a framework for peace were in place in a weekend social media post. Iran, however, later said no efforts were underway to conduct negotiations with the U.S., though Oman indicat...
Key Takeaways: E15 expansion would support corn and ethanol demand by increasing domestic biofuel consumption and reducing reliance on petroleum-based fuels. Year-round E15 has gained bipartisan momentum, but the policy remains in legislative limbo as lawmakers continue to negotiate provisions...
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.