Today production in South America or the Black Sea region and demand from China, North Africa or Southeast Asia are as important and influential to markets as production and demand in North America. This can also dilute or disperse the impact of price on supply and demand.Two of our favorite economic “laws” related to commodity markets are: the best cure for high prices is high prices and the flipside corollary, the best cure for low prices is low prices. The first presumes that high prices will inspire consumption to decline and supplies to increase to the point that supply and demand are better balanced, causing prices to retreat. The corollary presumes that low prices will encourage higher consumption and reduce supplies, causing prices...
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...
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.