This morning USDA announced a sale of 2.603 MMT of soybeans to China for 2018/19, part of the second tranche of 5 MMT that Chinese Vice-Premier Liu promised would be purchased as a negotiating “reward” when he and his group met with President Trump at the White House on 31 January. This is in addition to the 612,000 MT sale to China announced yesterday. USDA also announced a sale of 274,000 MT to unknown destinations for 2018/19, which could be related to China as well. Trade sources believe that almost the entire 5 MMT promised last Thursday have now been covered as of yesterday with perhaps a remaining tag end booked this morning. Another Chinese sales announcement is expected Wednesday morning. The Chinese government-owned b...
What You Need to Know Today: Russia rejected calls for a ceasefire in the Black Sea, including a proposal to halt attacks on civilian shipping that could help restore grain flows from Ukrainian ports. Tyson Foods announced plans to permanently close its Joslin, Illinois, beef processing facili...
The big news in the cattle markets yesterday was Tyson Foods’ move to close two more beef plants. One of them, the Joslin, Illinois, plant was shuttered immediately after the announcement. The other, in Eagle Mountain, Utah, is a case-ready plant that does not slaughter cattle. Tyson also...
The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) released the Consumer Price Index (CPI) on Wednesday. In July, the CPI rose 0.1 percent, seasonally adjusted, and rose 3.4 percent over the last 12 months, not seasonally adjusted. The index for all items less food and energy, or the “core” infla...
From WPI Consulting
Communicating importance of value-added products
Facing increasing pressure to quantify the value of export promotion efforts to investors, a U.S. industry organization retained WPI to develop a quantitative model that better communicated the importance of exports. The resulting model concluded that value-added meat exports contributed $0.45 cents per bushel to the price of corn, increasing support for that sector’s financial support of WPI’s client. In addition to serving the red meat industry with this type of analysis, WPI has generated similar deliverables for the U.S. soybean and poultry/egg industries.