The Federal Reserve’s Federal Open Market Committee (FMOC) was scheduled to meet on Wednesday of this week, but for the second time it took emergency action prior to the meeting. On Sunday, Chairman Jerome Powell announced a 100 basis point cut to the federal fund rate. This comes after the Fed announced an emergency 50 basis point rate cut on 3 March. That puts the rate in the range of 0 to 0.25 percent, to where it was lowered in 2008 and stayed until the end of 2015. In his statement Powell generally ruled out negative interest rates like Japan and Europe have had. Back in the fall of 2019, President Trump tweeted several times that the Fed should adopt negative interest rates, or at least get down to zero rates so that the...
What You Need to Know Today: The U.S. and Iran exchanged strikes, with the U.S. hitting Iranian bridges, energy sites, and military infrastructure. Iran launched a missile into Kuwait that damaged a desalination plant. Crude oil futures surged on heightened Middle East tensions, providing supp...
Congress returned this week from its Fourth of July recess, with another break scheduled for the month of August, to face a busy agenda before adjourning for the August recess. Congress has several priorities, including the National Defense Authorization Act, a potential third reconciliation pa...
There was a time, not so long ago, when you could easily explain U.S. agricultural policy. It was countercyclical and focused on risk management, especially for traditional row crops. There were a few exceptions, like dairy and sugar, which maintained the remnants of supply control. Participati...
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.