Current grain and soy futures markets remind us of two old market clichés. The first is, “bears make money, bulls make money, but hogs get slaughtered.” The second is, “you never go broke taking a profit.” It appears that some fund managers may have forgotten or ignored both sayings. They have stubbornly held on to long positions in corn futures despite the considerable fundamental and technical signs during the past few weeks that it was time to exit those positions. To be fair, there has been a fair amount of fund liquidation in recent days. At yesterday’s close, though, funds were still estimated to be long at least 100,000 contracts with aggregated losses that are still growing. We can be rightfully...
Accountability and a comprehensive approach to export programming
WPI’s team helped construct a strategic approach to develop, implement, and track promotional activities in 8 key regions across the globe for an agricultural export association. With continued progress measurement and strategic advisory services from WPI, the association has seen its ROI from investments in promotional programming increase by 44 percent over the past 5 years. Not only does this type of holistic approach to organizational strategy provide measurable results to track and analyze, it fosters top-down and bottom-up organizational accountability.
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...