Corn Argentina’s corn harvest advanced 9.2 percent last week, bringing the total harvest to 82 percent of the planted area. The harvest is 12 percent behind last year’s pace, but yields are above trendline, so large volumes are being originated daily. Farmer selling has increased considerable in the past few weeks and exporters are buying an average of 0.5 MMT each week. Exporters secured 0.8 MMT in the week ending 14 July, however, and 1 MMT for the week ending 21 July. There are no official numbers yet, but WPI expects another week of above-average origination for the last week of July. Farmers are harvesting large volumes and they need to keep selling (they sold 70 percent of the expected volume). Prices are st...
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.
What You Need to Know Today: Corn, wheat, and the soy complex all formed new contract or at least rally highs to close what has become one of the most uniformly bullish weeks in CBOT history. Escalations in the fighting between Russia and Ukraine and attacks on civilian merchant vessels show n...
Macro: Trade Flows Set the Tone Persian Gulf crude flows appear to be improving, with anecdotal estimates suggesting as much as 7–8 million barrels per day may now be leaving the region — nearly double the mid-July pace. That helps explain why crude has not maintained the full geopo...