Market volatility has risen with Covid and its latest iteration Omicron but has thus far underplayed the current security risks playing out in Eastern Europe. Energy and grain markets will experience just as much if not more turmoil if things go badly in Ukraine. Presidents Putin and Biden are having a telephone conversation today and bilateral diplomatic talks start on 10 January in Geneva. There are plenty of foreign policy experts in the region signaling that they expect the worse out of Moscow. Former Polish Foreign Minister Anna Fotyga argues that Vladimir Putin is making the same arguments about Ukraine that were made 100 years ago by Moscow when annexing local states to form the Soviet Union. European security expert Con...
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
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.