World Perspectives
softs

TPP Uncertainty; Disrupting Obesity; EU Insurance

Governments continue to be attracted to one-off tax schemes in an effort to fight the obesity epidemic and concurrently increase the budget coffer for politicians. Several such initiatives are pending in the U.S. as well as Europe. Uncertain TPP Push The trade policy and political machinery in Washington started cranking up this week for the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) in follow up to President Obama’s trip to Asia. Pivotal Republican Senator Orrin Hatch (Utah) softened his stance on addressing the goal of 12 years of intellectual property protection for biologics, support groups were unleashed to storm Capitol Hill, and surveys were highlighted showing Americans aren’t really anti-globalization. Still, the political hurdles are large...

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livestock

Livestock Industry Margins

Beef packer margins improved sharply, with estimated net losses narrowing to -$111/head from -$206/head the prior week. The recovery was driven by another firming in the boxed beef cutout, which rose to $379.00/cwt, while fed cattle prices softened modestly on the week. Even with the improvemen...

feed-grains soy-oilseeds wheat

Summary of Futures

May 26 Corn closed at $4.5375/bushel, down $0.0675 from yesterday's close.  May 26 Wheat closed at $6.0325/bushel, down $0.135 from yesterday's close.  May 26 Soybeans closed at $11.9625/bushel, down $0.045 from yesterday's close.  May 26 Soymeal closed at $313.5/short ton, down...

feed-grains soy-oilseeds wheat

Market Commentary: Crude Oil Rally and Crash Drives Whipsaw CBOT Action

The massive rally in energy markets remains the primary story underpinning ag markets. Front-month crude oil futures ripped higher overnight and traded above $100/brl for the first time since July 2022 before scoring an overnight high just shy of $120/brl. That strength pulled ag markets &ndash...

livestock

Livestock Industry Margins

Beef packer margins improved sharply, with estimated net losses narrowing to -$111/head from -$206/head the prior week. The recovery was driven by another firming in the boxed beef cutout, which rose to $379.00/cwt, while fed cattle prices softened modestly on the week. Even with the improvemen...

feed-grains soy-oilseeds wheat

Summary of Futures

May 26 Corn closed at $4.5375/bushel, down $0.0675 from yesterday's close.  May 26 Wheat closed at $6.0325/bushel, down $0.135 from yesterday's close.  May 26 Soybeans closed at $11.9625/bushel, down $0.045 from yesterday's close.  May 26 Soymeal closed at $313.5/short ton, down...

feed-grains soy-oilseeds wheat

Market Commentary: Crude Oil Rally and Crash Drives Whipsaw CBOT Action

The massive rally in energy markets remains the primary story underpinning ag markets. Front-month crude oil futures ripped higher overnight and traded above $100/brl for the first time since July 2022 before scoring an overnight high just shy of $120/brl. That strength pulled ag markets &ndash...

Process Standards as NTBs; Nazi Food

Process Standards as NTBs California’s Prop 12, which a House Agriculture Committee-passed farm bill is supposed to override, restricts the sale of pork and eggs in the state if not produced according to its restrictive standards. Such processing restrictions have long been used as nontar...

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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.

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