The CBOT saw the continued influence of fund managers and investors looking to bull spread commodities against equities, as well as the impact of (continually) escalating tensions between Russia and everyone else. Wheat futures rallied 15+ cents again Tuesday with short covering accelerating as the rally puts more and more positions underwater. What remains a mystery is how much long-side buying interest there is in wheat futures. Typically, fund managers love to be long wheat, especially in inflationary or “commodity boom” cycles, but the extremely volatile and unpredictable nature of Black Sea tensions may be causing risk managers to limit exposure. Corn futures rose sharply on Tuesday and posted fresh rally highs before slipp...
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
Illuminating the value of technical research
On behalf of a commodity producer organization, WPI evaluated the outputs from a project that featured a $5 million investment into technical research over multiple years. WPI’s team captured the results of this extensive effort and synthesized them for presentation to the organization’s governing board; among the findings uncovered and presented for the first time was the development of genomic traits proven, via rigorous testing, to provide crop yield advantages of 50 percent or more to U.S. farmers in times of drought. Capturing measurable results from long-term efforts can be challenging. Educating clients on the dynamics of success measurement when quantifiable results are not readily available requires deep client-consultant collaboration and an ability to consider both near- and long-term client aspirations with market/policy dynamics – attributes that WPI brings to every consulting engagement.