General Comments Markets were firm to strong in the Sunday evening session, and continued that strength through most of this morning before backing off aro...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

WPI provides a summary of the week's futures price activity and the gains/losses experiences by grain, oilseed, and livestock markets. Additionally, today'...

Milling Wheat Ukraine announced a wheat export ban beginning 15 November. Since the start of the campaign, about 3.5 MMT have been exported from Ukraine. W...

Last Monday's crop progress report showed that 71 percent of the U.S. 2013 winter wheat crop has been planted. That is exactly on the five-year average for...

If President Obama were of the mind to label China a currency manipulator, this week would have been the perfect opportunity. The Treasury Department was t...

General Comments Grain and soy futures markets generally tapered down today to end a choppy up-and-down week with spurts of heavy trading volume interspers...

General Comments Markets started steady to slightly better yesterday afternoon and the momentum higher continued to build throughout today's session. The b...

U.S.-EU Contrast on Biofuel The EU announced its new policy is to limit biofuel made from food to 5 percent, end its subsidies by 2020, and mandate a 60 pe...

USDA Releases Final 2011/12 Export Sales Report for Soymeal and Soyoil USDA today released the final export sales reports for soymeal and soyoil for the 20...

Traceability for Antibiotics in Feed Energy and Commerce Committee Ranking Member Congressman Henry Waxman this week announced that he will introduce...

Yesterday's announcement of the sale of the Kansas City Board of Trade (KCBOT) to the CME Group is another reminder of just how much the grain business in...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

Russian Grain Markets: 8-12 October 2012 Harvesting Updates The Russian Ministry of Agriculture on 12 October updated its total grain harvest forecast for...

General Comments The CME Group has agreed to buy the Kansas City Board of Trade (KCBOT) for $126 million, according to news reports today. The KCBOT wheat...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

"Nothing is certain except that nothing is certain." The same can be said about the markets' often unpredictable nature. Bob Kohlmeyer commented on this ca...

Corn The corn market in Argentina continues to be relatively quiet. Offers for old crop corn are scarce, with sellers asking for 15 October and November sh...

Scientists Discover Gene Controlling Resistance to Cyst Nematode in Soybeans The cyst nematode is the most costly pest that impacts soybean yields in the U...

Geography and Politics The farm bill may be an issue in some political contests this year (see Dave Juday's piece on 15 October), but it does not define mo...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

General Comments Grain and soy futures traded higher overnight, and they tried to maintain that momentum today. It worked for a time, but the momentum was...

During the last several weeks, investment/speculative money has been fleeing long positions in commodity markets for agriculture, energy and metals. Lookin...

The second presidential debate will be held tonight in New York City, and a group of undecided voters will be posing the questions. It is unlikely that the...

News Updates EGYPT COMMENTS In order to control the fuel shortage problems in the country and attack the expensive fuel subsidy programs, the Egyptian gove...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

India's Economic Growth Are India's economic woes over, and could there be an economic turnaround? Experts believe that a turnaround could happen in the ne...

Mitt Romney last week blamed the lack of a completed farm bill out of Congress on the lack of leadership from the White House (see Gary Blumenthal, WPI 9 O...

Price levels for the federal crop insurance programs have been a crucial ingredient in the net farm income levels of farmers, and the crop revenue insuranc...

General Comments There was no letup in the selling pressures across the soy complex when markets opened Sunday evening. The selling in soybeans spread over...

High Expectations for New Corn Price This is the time of the year when the Chinese government's procurement price for new crop corn becomes a hot topic amo...

Food Fight IV Foodie Michael Pollan wrote in The New York Times that California's Prop 37 requiring labeling of boiotech foods is not about food safety or...

Milling Wheat Wheat prices in the Black Sea remained about unchanged this week. The liquidity is shrinking as the offered volume is decreasing significantl...

The status of E15 has been overwhelmed by the drought and the subsequent requests to waive the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) for 2012/13, but automakers re...

General Comments Markets opened weak yesterday afternoon. That weakness continued to build throughout the night and accelerated at 9:30 a.m. when the open...

WPI provides a summary of the week's futures price activity and the gains/losses experiences by grain, oilseed, and livestock markets. Additionally, today'...

Yesterday's USDA supply and demand estimates should be considered at least somewhat bullish. U.S. ending supply estimates for corn, wheat and soybeans sugg...

Following is an ad hoc summary of some of the important numbers from USDA's October WASDE.In a year of drought and tight supplies, every month's fresh esti...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

Cattle Feeding Isn't for Sissies Feedlots are facing a challenging year. Thus far in 2012, cattle supplies are about 2.455 times under feedlot capacity and...

Hunger for Better Facts There were some odd side notes with the International Food Policy Research Institute's (IFPRI) release of its Global Hunger Index a...

General Comments Prior to today's October crop estimates and the WASDE, money managers who were actively paring down their long futures positions in the so...

USDA Boosts U.S. Soybean Production and Usage To no one's surprise, USDA today raised its forecast for U.S. soybean yields, production and consumption in 2...

Corn Market This week the corn market in Argentina continued to be relatively quiet. A significant volume of export licenses for old crop corn were approve...

General Comments When a federal judge threw out CFTC's arduously constructed new regulations setting position limits for commodity futures markets on 28 Se...

Four years ago, amid a global economic crisis and a presidential race, the markets certainly were not boring to watch. "Every day brings its own set of fac...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

Rich versus Poor The IMF/World Bank meetings in Tokyo this week are providing some geopolitical and policy drama. China's refusal to send a top level offic...

The Dairy Security Act provisions in the 2012 Farm Bill continue to be a point of controversy in the industry even though both congressional Agriculture Co...

Russian Grain Markets: 1-5 October 2012 Harvesting Updates Russian Ag Minister Nikolai Fedorov on 9 October changed the 2012 grain harvest forecast in net...

General Comments The IMF lowered its already anemic forecasts of world economic growth for this and next year, and by implication, raised its view of the c...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

USDA's October WASDE with revised estimates of 2012 U.S. corn and soybean production estimates will be released Thursday (11 October) morning. In this year...

Palm Oil Prices Near Bottom? Anyone who has been watching the palm oil market knows palm oil prices have plummeted in recent months. Weighed down by expand...

News Updates EGYPT COMMENTS The effect of Egypt's wheat purchases recently and the amount of power GASC has in world markets has been a widely covered topi...

The Fed's decision to move into round three of quantitative easing (QE3) was a bit of a surprise -- at least it wasn't expected to happen during the Fed's...

Proving that spin and perception are the politician's friend, Mitt Romney told an Iowa farm audience today that the lack of a completed farm bill out of th...

Politicons The petroleum industry gets a politically inspired federal investigation every time gasoline prices rise above consumer comfort levels. This yea...

USDA will release its October crop production updates and WASDE revisions Thursday at 7:30 a.m. CT. There is little question that most -- maybe all -- eyes...

Rupee is Stronger Post Reforms The Indian rupee was stronger by almost Rs. 3.17 (5.37 percent) in a 30-day period, down from Rs. 55.35 on 9 September to Rs...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

General Comments The U.S. government was on holiday today. There were no USDA reports, including weekly export inspections, weekly crop progress numbers, o...

General Comments It was a quiet session overnight with soybeans firmer and corn and wheat slightly weaker. That was the pattern throughout much of the day,...

The new era of extreme price volatility coupled with very high prices and equally high crop insurance revenue guarantees have made it tough for the minor o...

WPI provides a summary of the week's futures price activity and the gains/losses experiences by grain, oilseed, and livestock markets. Additionally, today'...

Milling Wheat The Black Sea wheat market is firmer. The domestic market in Russia has rallied to levels that are above the export parity. This is logical c...

Agriculture Losing the War Modern agricultural practices will never obtain approval from their philosophical antagonists; the goal is to explain agricultur...

The old adage that high prices cure high prices is being proved again by the energy sector. U.S. petroleum output has been growing since 2008, based largel...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

Canada's Canola Crop Forecast Well Below Analysts' Expectations Statistics Canada today released its estimates for that country's 2012 crops and the foreca...

Corn Market The Argentine corn FOB market continues to be pretty similar to what was reported last week. Some trading houses are running out of corn export...

U.S. Economy for the Birds The U.S. Poultry and Egg Association, National Chicken Council, National Turkey Federation and United Egg Producers have issued...

No American Rats Dying Unsurprisingly, the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) opined that the rat study carried out by anti-biotech researcher Gilles-Er...

General Comments The Turkish attack on a Syrian military installation may be part of the reason for today's increase in gasoline and crude oil prices, but...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

Russian Grain Markets: 27-30 September 2012 Harvesting Updates As of 28 September, Russia harvested grains and grain legumes on 36 million hectares, or 91...

Farmers Pick Cash Some EU member states are pressing for budget reductions in Brussels, and that could factor into the current effort at reforming the Comm...

General Comments China is on holiday and market conditions are similar to when parents are gone or when the boss is out of the office: the market is free t...

The CBOT day session opened one hour late on Tuesday, 2 October 2007 due to technical problems. According to WPI's Bob Kohlmeyer: It was clear that profess...

Activists Kick Butt The attack on conventional agriculture by activists is getting stranger by the day. Now it is reported that activist investor Carl Icah...

The farm bill expired on Sunday, and by Monday the anticipated recriminations were flying. Various statements and tweets from the Democratic leadership tar...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

News Updates EGYPT COMMENTS The government of Egypt is making every effort to reduce subsidies on some major food items. As reported a few weeks ago, the g...

General Comments As Dave Juday noted yesterday, in response to a suit filed against the CFTC by two swaps and financial market trade associations in the U...

Taiwan Crushers Tender for Soybeans Encouraged by the recent sharp drop in soybean futures prices, Taiwan's Breakfast Soybean Procurement Association (BSPA...

The corn and soybean harvests are going full blast in the United States. Those of us with long -- though not necessarily accurate -- memories can recall fa...

Commodities and Elections Financial and commodity indicators correlate with elections, but there is a more important conclusion. Soy Prices Fail to Ration...

Chinese Government Likely to Raise the Purchasing Price for Corn Recently, market discussions suggest that the Chinese government is likely to raise the 20...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

General Comments The start of the new quarter brought buying to financial markets but not to commodity markets. Corn futures were firmer on, as one trader...

Back in January, the International Swaps and Derivatives Association (ISDA) and Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association (SIFMA) filed a lawsu...

Food Grain Production Down, Rainfall Deficit at 7.6 Percent The government of India (GOI) last week released its first 2012/13 crop and grain production es...

Last Friday's USDA quarterly stocks report found about 40 million bushels more soybeans than expected. That news started the soybean market lower and it wa...

Trade Liberalization Wow Doha is dead, long live Doha; and Africa is a continental backwater -- all no more! Largely given up for dead, apparently the true...

This morning's USDA quarterly stocks numbers threw bullish corn and wheat numbers at the market. The soybean number was slightly bearish. Needless to say,...

General Comments A bullish USDA quarterly stocks report following two weeks or so of big time fund liquidation caught corn and wheat markets too short with...

Milling Wheat Russian and Ukrainian wheat prices are increasing sharply. It's difficult to find offers for October, and there are no offers at all for Dece...

The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) today released a report on the Self-Employment Contributions Act (SECA), or unemployment taxes. CBO in its report con...

Yes on Biotech Labeling Comedian/commentator Bill Maher's comment on the American people is that "[t]hey're not very bright." The real problem is that ther...

WPI provides a summary of the week's futures price activity and the gains/losses experiences by grain, oilseed, and livestock markets. Additionally, today'...

China Sells More Reserve Soybeans The Chinese government today sold an additional 400,001 MT of soybeans from its reserve stocks. The soybeans were sold to...

Fewer and Heavier Cattle Mean Less Feed Last week's Cattle on Feed report showed an 11 percent drop in placements despite industry expectations of placemen...

Corn Market By the end of last week after some trades were made, Argentine corn premiums became firmer. This week the FOB market remained the same. Main is...

Broad Pain from Tomatoes The Commerce Department has preliminarily suspended a tomato antidumping agreement with Mexico that was negotiated back in 1996. T...

General Comments In anticipation of tomorrow's Grain Stocks report, market participants may have reversed the old adage, "buy the rumor, sell the fact," in...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

Friday, 28 September 2001 was a "day of getting clobbered" in the markets, according to WPI's Ben Beneke. It is unclear what started it: "the general neutr...

General Comments Consumers can be more flexible with gasoline consumption than food consumption, so it does not make a lot of sense that European economic...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

Wrong-Way Trade Policy Trade policy remains a wreck with countries concurrently practicing their own protectionism while complaining vehemently about that...

Russian Grain Markets: 17-21 September 2012 Harvesting and Planting Updates National Grain Producers Union President Pavel Skurihin forecasted that Russia...

President Barack Obama and Mitt Romney recently outlined their stances on agriculture issues for the American Farm Bureau Federation (AFBF). This is as clo...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

Soymeal Consumption to Rise in North Africa and Middle East Despite Turmoil The revolutions that have taken place in the primarily Muslim countries of the...

News Updates EGYPT COMMENTS Egypt's GASC said that in recent weeks it has built up the strategic wheat stockpiles to a level that can cover the country's n...

General Comments Corn has sold off a dollar and soybeans almost $2 in the past month. The strong basis and slow decline in open interest makes it appear th...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

USDA will release its 1 September quarterly stocks report this Friday. These quarterly stocks reports have been very tricky to interpret recently, especial...

Things are looking up for the Brazilian sugarcane sector despite world sugar prices stuck at near-two-year lows of 19 cents per pound (U.S. sugar prices ar...

Negative Attitude Towards GMOs Increases Among Chinese Consumers Chinese consumers are becoming less tolerant of GMOs, according to a survey conducted by t...

Reform Process Continues The Indian government (GOI) is keen to continue the reform process it began back in 1991. While growth was positive in some years,...

General Comments Note: Last Friday we reported that negotiations in the labor dispute at Pacific Northwest (PNW) ports had been extended for 90 days. That...

WPI provides a summary of the week's futures price activity and the gains/losses experiences by grain, oilseed, and livestock markets. Additionally, today'...

Dennis Gartman (of The Gartman Report) reportedly told an audience to short John Deere stock because U.S. farmers won't have any money to buy farm equipmen...

General Comments It was another very erratic overnight session with wide price swings, especially in the soy complex. November soybeans traded as much as 1...

House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) on Thursday officially commented on the fate of the farm bill. "We will deal with the farm bill after the election," he...

Pigs of the Future: Impact on Feed The high feed costs as a result of the drought have led to a reduction -- rather than what was expected to be an expansi...

Drought Cuts Australian Canola Crop Forecast The Australian Oilseeds Federation (AOF) this week reduced its forecast for that country's upcoming canola har...

Reason for RFS Waiver Currently attention is being focused on the near-term impact of the current short crop and whether the Environmental Protection Agenc...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

General Comments The December 2012 corn contract may be forming a double bottom at $7.39. If this contract closes out the week strong tomorrow, then a temp...

With harvest only months away, Australian wheat production remains on a familiar knife-edge -- the scope for wheat production remains as wide as ever (20-2...

Biotech Hurdles France: France initially announced that it planned to keep its "moratorium" on the planting of biotech crops. The difference is that "morat...

General Comments Yesterday it was noted that there were buyers waiting at lower prices for the market to come their way. Increasing numbers of those prospe...

Corn Market After the release of new corn export licenses, the government began authorizing specific requests from each trading house. More than 0.8 MMT we...

Russian Grain Markets: 10-14 September 2012 Harvesting Updates The Russian Grain Union forecasts the grain crop in that country at 72 MMT. The crop current...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

The "winds of change" swept through the pits in Chicago on Wednesday morning, 15 September 1999. According to WPI's Gregg Doud: In reality, there was very...

General Comments Brazilian farmers were allowed to start planting soybeans as of this past weekend. From 15 June until 15 September no soybeans were suppos...

News Updates EGYPT COMMENTS Egypt's GASC was back in the wheat market, booking another 235,000 MT of wheat as of last Thursday. This included 120,000 MT of...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

The White House released its sequester report late last week, outlining the potential cuts to various government programs. The following is a summary of sc...

The possibility of aflatoxin in harvested corn is a frightening prospect to all market participants. Aflatoxin is a carcinogen produced by certain mold fun...

No Cooperation at Forum Apparently, USDA's September WASDE report was not sufficiently comforting on food prices. France has sent notice of a "Rapid Respon...

EPA Sets Biodiesel Blend Mandate at 1.28 Billion Gallons The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) last Friday announced that it will set the biodiese...

China Continues to Spend on Farmland Improvement China's Ministry of Finance (MOF) recently announced that the government will invest $5.9 billion this yea...

General Comments Grain and oilseed markets started lower Sunday evening. The selling snowballed as the night wore on with another major leg down happening...

Irrigation Infrastructure and New Technology Can Help Agriculture India has approximately 140 million hectares of net cultivated area (the gross area of 19...

You would think that when supplies of corn and soybeans are headed to their tightest levels ever you would see strong basis levels. The opposite is true to...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

India's Modest Reform A group of Indian agribusiness representatives is in Washington to explain India's export potential and pitch for foreign direct inve...

The House last week passed a continuing resolution (CR) to fund the federal government through 2013. And as we predicted on 10 September, the CR did not co...

Milling Wheat The milling wheat market in the Black Sea is much firmer. The catalyst for the rally was the seventh GASC tender in six weeks. Russian wheat...

Sequester Issues Earlier this summer the federal agencies appeared to be oblivious as to the implications of the fiscal cliff scheduled for 2013. Indeed, t...

General Comments Yesterday's Federal Reserve announcement that it will inject $40 billion per month into the economy buoyed U.S. and world financial market...

WPI provides a summary of the week's futures price activity and the gains/losses experiences by grain, oilseed, and livestock markets. Additionally, today'...

The September USDA reports again verified just how severely U.S. corn and soybean production was impacted by the drought of 2012. We can all still argue ab...

WASDE As could be expected, yesterday's WASDE showed a decrease in meat and poultry production based on an increase in beef driven by drought liquidation,...

General Comments Grain and soy futures traded in mixed fashion overnight. Corn, soybeans and wheat prices were on both sides in fairly active trade. Wheat...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

When we first became involved in trading grain and soybeans, one of the most impressive features of grain trade practices for us was the casual, off-handed...

High Winds Reduce Canada's Canola Production The amount of canola Canada harvests this year will be reduced as a result of high winds that occurred this we...

Floods During the past week, excessive precipitation fell over central Buenos Aires, flooding a third of the area. In some cases, this rainfall duplicated...

Biotech Shifts The assault on agricultural biotechnology has increased in the United States and Prop 37 (mandatory labeling) in California is a major threa...

USDA's eagerly awaited September WASDE was greeted happily by corn market bears and soybean market bulls. USDA reduced the 2012/13 average corn yield from...

On Thursday, 12 September 2002, USDA's September WASDE "gave the market what it had anticipated," and as a result, "overbought signal and profit-taking wer...

Today's WASDE report was considered bearish for corn because the national average corn yield of 122.8 bushels per acre was larger than the average analyst...

Green Policies Take Beating The economic doldrums on both sides of the Atlantic, coupled with other concerns, are forcing environmental goals to take a bac...

General Comments Basically, CME grain and soy futures trade today was a tale of two markets. USDA's modest cuts in 2012 production prospects and a 2012/13...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

Russian Grain Markets: 3-7 September 2012 Harvesting Updates The Russian Ministry of Agriculture announced that as of 10 September, farmers harvested grain...

EU Commission Proposes to Scale Back Use of Food Crops for Biofuel The EU Commission has drafted new rules that would substantially scale back the use of f...

Trans-Atlantic Analytical Differences EU Agriculture Commissioner Dacian Ciolos indicates he is prepared to discuss the role of biofuels given concerns by...

General Comments In the 14 trading days since 21 August, the CME December corn contract has dropped about 63 cents. Price action has been choppy and irregu...

While more than 40 farm and commodity groups in the Farm Bill Now coalition rally for congressional action on a farm bill, the American Enterprise Institut...

News Updates EGYPT COMMENTS The Egyptian government stated that all details required for its IMF loan should be in place in about two months, and that it e...

In a "normal" year the September WASDE yield and crop estimates are usually just bridges between the August WASDE, when the estimates reflect the first act...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

Indian Monsoon May Not Be Enough Despite the fact that the monsoon rain deficit is declining due to its a late resurgence (it is now at 9 percent), it may...

Ethanol's Lagging Support After correctly perceiving the drought drying up its political support in Washington, the ethanol industry is mounting a tour de...

USDA will update its crop production and ending supply estimates Wednesday morning. Obviously, these are very important numbers because it is very likely t...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

Back in 1979 President Jimmy Carter famously described the malaise that he perceived gripping the nation. While Carter never actually used the term "malais...

Chinese Consumers Turn Toward Imported Food A recent survey conducted by an international market research firm shows that more Chinese consumers have turne...

General Comments Markets were mixed to start the Sunday evening session and traded both sides of unchanged throughout the night. Corn, wheat and soybeans w...

One factor the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) will rely upon for its analysis of the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) on corn prices is the price...

Milling Wheat Russian wheat continues to be the cheapest for September shipment. November shipment is offered at a high premium against September since the...

General Comments Markets were weak overnight with soybeans showing the greatest weakness. Wheat was firm and eventually traded sharply higher. Corn traded...

WPI provides a summary of the week's futures price activity and the gains/losses experiences by grain, oilseed, and livestock markets. Additionally, today'...

Stats Canada released its 31 July stocks report this morning and it continued to follow the trend of smaller-than-expected numbers (see table below).It is...

Laggard Trade Policy Free trade advocates have long complained about the Obama Administration's laggard initiative on such negotiations. However, the Romne...

Shameless Category Protectionism knows no bounds as the Made in the USA Foundation announces it has filed a lawsuit against the WTO for determining that th...

Grain and soy markets are easing their way toward next Wednesday's September WASDE from USDA, and all eyes will be on the USDA NASS updated yield and produ...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

Long-Term Demand Destruction in Feed Sector While corn and soybean futures prices jumped 41 percent and 33 percent, respectively, since the start of June,...

General Comments History seldom repeats itself precisely, but human nature is fairly consistent. Prices are reflections of human behavior under similar cir...

Indian Soymeal Sales Plummet in August India's soymeal exports last month totaled only 10,005 MT, which was 95 percent lower than exports of 165,510 MT in...

Russian Grain Markets: 22-28 August 2012 GRAINS AND PRODUCTS Harvesting Updates According to the Russian Ag Ministry's Department of Crop Production, as of...

China Secures Agricultural Investments Overseas China Oil and Foodstuffs Co., (COFCO), the nation's largest food manufacturer, and New Hope Group, China's...

General Comments Grain and soy prices closed weaker in another low volume day session following the trend established earlier in overnight trade. More liqu...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

Ethanol After Argentina's large investment in biodiesel plants during the last few years, the next step will be developing corn crushing plants to produce...

Ethanol trade association Growth Energy in a letter to Arkansas Governor Mike Beebe wrote that the end result of waiver to the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS...

On Tuesday, 7 September 1999, many traders were hoping to see bullish markets. Bob Kohlmeyer wrote: They are sick of the low price, low volatility, low vol...

India Quarterly GDP Growth Lowest in 10 Years During the first quarter of FY 2013 (April-June), India's GDP grew 5.5 percent over the corresponding quarter...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

News Updates AFRICA COMMENTS The Kenyan government has decided to import maize into government-held strategic stocks to ensure that the supply in the count...

It has been a long, hot (and dry) summer for U.S. soybean growers. It also has been an unusually hot summer for U.S. soybean exporters. Brazilian and Argen...

General Comments Grain and soy futures staged a strong price rally overnight as prospects for tight supplies again outweighed anything the bears had to off...

Indian Soy Processors Too Optimistic About Soymeal Exports Reports indicate India has begun its 2012/13 soymeal export sales program with sales of about 25...

Democrats Evolve The holding of power necessitates responsibility. This year's Democratic Party platform commits to "free and fair trade" and boasts that t...

The Federal Reserve recently released its minutes on the 31 July – 1 August Federal Open Market Committee (FMOC) meeting, giving insight into the central b...

General Comments Grain and the soy complex faced three important or potentially important influences today. First, there was the Russian Food Security Coun...

Milling Wheat The Black Sea milling wheat market remained about unchanged. This morning the Russian government decided not to restrict exports for the time...

The debate over just how small the U.S. corn and soybean crops are, along with how much rationing has been accomplished, will rage on for another couple of...

WPI provides a summary of the week's futures price activity and the gains/losses experiences by grain, oilseed, and livestock markets. Additionally, today'...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

Non-Biotech Subsidies -- Taxpayers Although there is no final decision as yet, it looks as though it will be the taxpayer on the hook to compensate growers...

RFS Waiver on the Clock Two more states, Texas and Virginia, have petitioned the Environmental Protection Agency to waive the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS)...

Southeast Asian Ag Sector Surprisingly Optimistic As I mentioned yesterday, this week I am participating in the 9th Annual Southeast Asia Agricultural Coop...

The hue and cry over the ethanol use mandate in the U.S. Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) and the possibility that the Russian government might intervene in t...

General Comments There was no follow-through buying when the markets re-opened late yesterday afternoon following the very strong performance of corn, whea...

Russian Grain Markets: 22-28 August 2012 GRAINS AND PRODUCTS Harvesting Updates According to the Russian Ag Ministry's Department of Crop Production, Russi...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

General Comments It has been rare for wheat to be the futures market leader recently, but that is exactly what happened today. After five straight losing d...

Corn There were several inquiries for Argentine corn for October, November and December shipment. As a result, some trades were made at -55 CZ for November...

Demand Rationing of Soy Not Apparent in Southeast Asia This week I am attending and speaking at the 9th Southeast Asia Agricultural Cooperators Conference...

Eggs Rule Mexico has announced a substantial increase in the duty free egg import quota from the U.S. An avian influenza outbreak has shortened domestic su...

Grain and soybean futures markets seem to have hit something of a vacuum. They have lost direction, at least temporarily, and they have become rather dull...

News Updates There was not too much grain trade activity in North Africa and the Middle East in the past week due to the Eid holidays following Ramadan.The...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

The Renewable Fuels Association (RFA) recently argued (see WPI 23 August) that one reason it would be a bad idea to waive the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS)...

Biotech Facts versus Organic Kills The battle over Proposition 37 in California that would require labeling of food products produced using biotechnology i...

General Comments Overnight trading was muted with prices mostly mixed with trade on both sides of the previous closes. Volumes were low, and a lack of inte...

Wheat Shortage Despite Huge Procurement India's wheat production for 2011/12, according to the July update from the government of India's (GOI) Ministry of...

Back in October 2010, the Federal Reserve undertook Operation Twist, whereby it sold $400 million in short-term bonds (maturities of three years or less) i...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

General Comments Markets started the week very firm Sunday evening, with November soybeans again setting new all-time price highs. Corn and wheat were also...

The next major USDA reports are scheduled to be released on Wednesday, 12 September. These will include new crop production estimates and the revised month...

The Republican Convention is getting underway in Tampa, and while party platforms are largely ignored documents after the meeting is over, they make for go...

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney released his proposed U.S. energy policy this week and it is no different than President Obama's in that both...

WPI provides a summary of the week's futures price activity and the gains/losses experiences by grain, oilseed, and livestock markets. Additionally, today'...

Milling Wheat Russian and Ukrainian wheat remain the cheapest origins by far. It may sound illogical that the Russian wheat is so cheap after all the bulli...

The most important question for these markets over the next six to 12 months will be how the massive job of rationing corn and soybean demand gets accompli...

General Comments Wheat, corn and soybean marketers were all very firm in the evening session and held most of those gains until prices started to falter ar...

Republican presidential Mitt Romney yesterday released a 21-page "comprehensive" energy policy plan to "achieve North American energy independence by 2020...

Back when we first got involved in the grain business and in grain merchandizing, grain export activity was not very important to futures markets. Or perha...

Corn Argentine corn FOB market premiums are weak and there is a lack of demand. Spot shipments (August and September) are offered at 5-10 cents/bushel lowe...

Argentina Still Subsidizes Biodiesel Exports Contrary to earlier reports, Argentina has not completely eliminated its export incentives for biodiesel. Whil...

Glass Half-Full Argentina Yesterday we speculated about a positive that could come out of Argentina's challenge to U.S. barriers to imports of its lemons a...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

General Comments Markets took another breather today. After early gains could not be sustained, prices began to slide lower. The change in direction create...

Drought Effect: Freezer Busting Inventories Because of the drought, drought-fueled corn and feed prices, and lost pasture, more beef and pork is being push...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

Ineffective Aid U.S. Agency for International Development official Nancy Lindborg says the Sahel region of Africa is in the midst of long-term drought and...

General Comments Minutes of the Federal Reserve Bank's August Federal Open Market Committee (FMOC) meeting were released today, and they show a growing til...

Russian Grain Markets: 15-21 August 2012 GRAINS AND PRODUCTS Harvesting and Planting Updates According to Petr Chekmarev, director of the Russian Ag Minist...

With all that is going on in U.S. and world agriculture, we feel out of touch after having been away for just a few days. Good or bad, we are in a period o...

General Comments With a barrage of tweets from participants on Pro Farmer's Midwest crop tour commenting on how bad crops look, futures prices had nowhere...

Commodity Analytics shows the most recent data for grain export sales and shipments along with historic patterns. Current deviations from historic norms po...

  News Updates Ramadan has finished and all Muslim countries are currently celebrating Eid-Al-Fitr — the festival of breaking the fast. Most off...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

Crop Insurance Spike U.S. farmers have been steadily increasing the land they have under crop insurance coverage, and based on research published in the Jo...

Corn prices are creeping back up again, nearing the $8.43 record price set earlier this month. That's being viewed as a signal that not enough demand has b...

The Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) has been trying to remove the word "navigable" from the language of the Clean Water Act (CWA) as it refer...

Russia at U.S. Political Conventions Russia's trade regime officially changes over to the WTO's better standards on Wednesday, but U.S. industry cannot ben...

The corn and soybean crops in the U.S. are bordering on disastrous this year because of the major drought that affected nearly every part of the Corn Belt...

General Comments Markets were just slightly higher to start Sunday evening but gradually built on that early firmness and were strong by the time the sun r...

India's Economic Growth: Drastic Need for Reforms The Prime Minister's Economic Advisory Council (PMEAC) last week pegged India's GDP forecast at 6.7 perce...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

General Comments Markets were quietly strong much of today, and funds were noted as light buyers. There was no special or fresh news today. Financial marke...

The USDA blog has much of its space dedicated to food inflation and the drought. One entry, dated 10 August, is USDA's response to the current question on...

Milling Wheat The Black Sea milling wheat market is slightly weaker in sympathy with Chicago and Matif due to the slow demand. Despite the bullish stories...

WPI provides a summary of the week's futures price activity and the gains/losses experiences by grain, oilseed, and livestock markets. Additionally, today'...

The U.S. drought has pushed corn and soybean prices to new all-time highs following the drought-reduced production in Brazil and Argentina. Problems in Rus...

The United States is agreeing with France and current G-20 leader Mexico to possibly hold the first meeting of the rapid response forum created as a result...

RFS Waiver on the Clock, or Will Be Soon Southern Governors Mike Beebe (D-Arkansas) and Beverly Purdue (D-North Carolina) this week have joined Maryland an...

We might have to reduce corn acres in the U.S. in 2013 because of a potential planting seed shortage. Seed was very tight in 2012 because of the big incr...

General Comments Markets were mixed in the night session with soybeans trading as much as 13-15 cents lower at one point. The tenor of the markets changed...

Argentina Reportedly Pressuring Grain Exporters to Sell Stocks I wrote on Tuesday that the Argentine government's dire need for tax revenue and foreign exc...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

Politics of Ethanol The Des Moines Register chides President Obama for visiting Iowa and highlighting his differences with Republican rival Mitt Romney ove...

General Comments Demand rationing markets can be particularly difficult to trade. Greater emphasis needs to be placed on factors such as basis because the...

Shorting the Market The Thai Ministry of Commerce is reportedly assembling its ASEAN counterparts to negotiate the creation of a trading cartel in rice. Ap...

Corn Argentine corn basis levels are weaker this week, especially for spot shipments (August and September) where seller's ideas are in the -65 CZ to -70 C...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

It seems ironic that established government policy can have the opposite effect of its stated objectives. For example, the vast majority of congressional r...

Russian Grain Markets: 7-14 August, 2012 GRAINS AND PRODUCTS Harvest As of 14 August, grains and leguminous crops have been harvested on 21,062,800 hectare...

News Updates EGYPT UPDATE At long last Egypt was back in the wheat market, validating the forecast of several experts. Egypt's GASC bought 120,000 MT of Ru...

The August WASDE confirmed -- if there was any doubt -- that drought-reduced production of U.S. soybeans and corn in 2012 absolutely will require that dome...

The American Coalition for Ethanol (ACE) last Friday held its convention in Omaha, Nebraska. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack spoke to ACE members shortly...

General Comments Corn and soy markets tried hard to make it a "Turnaround Tuesday." Prices firmed slightly in overnight trade, and this continued into the...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

All the Wrong Hunger Targets Owen Barder with the Center for Global Development pegs it when he points to the errors in policymakers' approaches to global...

Argentina Eliminates All Export Incentives for Biodiesel Last Friday the Argentine government in a surprise move acted to immediately raise the export tax...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

Sugar Undermines TPP Former U.S. agricultural trade negotiator Jim Grueff says U.S. aggies are already ambivalent about a Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) a...

This weekend, presumptive Republican Presidential nominee Mitt Romney chose Representative Paul Ryan (R-Wisconsin) to be his vice presidential running mate...

Parliamentary Panel Junks GM Crops, Asks For Complete Ban Coinciding with the 10th anniversary of Bt cotton's introduction in India is the release of a par...

General Comments Despite the tightest potential supply/demand situation facing U.S. grains and soybeans in many, many years, grain and soy markets found ve...

The long awaited August WASDE has come and gone. Even though USDA's surveys confirmed huge yield and production losses for corn and soybeans that exceeded...

Somewhere in the White House and the USDA cage, people realized that USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack's invitation to speak to the American Coalition for Ethanol...

Milling Wheat The Black Sea milling wheat market remains quiet due to slow demand from the major destinations. The Russian government has decided not to in...

General Comments Corn got all dressed up today and had nowhere to go. The WASDE report was bullish in comparison to the average analysts' expectations. Pri...

WPI provides a summary of the week's futures price activity and the gains/losses experiences by grain, oilseed, and livestock markets. Additionally, today'...

Bulls looking for affirmation in today's WASDE report were not disappointed. USDA slashed its corn and soybean production estimates. While the market alrea...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

WASDE Waiver Watch To start the clock for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to consider an RFS waiver, such a request would have to come from...

It is certain that the most pervasive common thread throughout USDA's August WASDE will be that world supplies of wheat, coarse grains and oilseeds are shr...

Fairly Good Exports Sales Last Week Today's USDA export sales report indicated U.S. exporters had fairly good sales last week. The report showed 105,200 MT...

General Comments The "official" beginning of the global financial crisis occurred five years ago today in 2007 when the ECB was forced to pump 95 billion e...

The law of unintended consequences endlessly reveals itself in public policymaking, particularly in areas where it is most market distorting. Mandating the...

Farm Bill Prospects House Republican leaders balked at bringing the farm bill to the floor before the August recess, but at least three subsequent developm...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

Russian Grain Markets: 1-6 August 2012 GRAINS AND PRODUCTS Harvest As of 3 August, Russia harvested 1.5 MMT less grain and leguminous crops than it did at...

Corn Argentine corn basis levels are now weaker than they were in our last report, especially those for August and September shipments, where there is big...

General Comments It seems fitting as we await USDA's yield and production estimates for 2012's drought-stricken corn and soybean crops that the National We...

Far, far away from scorched corn fields in the Midwest, removed from Chicago, the financial center of commodity-based industries, beyond the horizon from W...

Drought Implications The drought has brought with it a variety of explanations and proposed solutions. The Great Drought of 2012 A drought is loosely defin...

Brazil to Sharply Increase Biotech Plantings The Brazilian consulting group Celeres is predicting that Brazilian farmers will use biotech varieties to plan...

With drought afflicting crops elsewhere, many are assessing crop conditions in the Black Sea Region, and particularly in Russia. Rumor has it that, like tw...

General Comments We so often cite the trade's anticipation of certain reports from USDA that it has probably become a cliche. However, it would be hard to...

Soft Drink Taxes Need Study New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg stirred a wide array of opinions when he suggested limiting soft drink sales to 12 ounces...

News Updates EGYPT UPDATE The new government in Egypt has issued a formal invitation to the IMF to resume talks on the $3.2 billion loan. The finance minis...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

By now nearly everyone involved in agriculture or in activities even remotely connected with agriculture is aware that USDA will release a crop report (the...

While the war wages over the decision to waive the ethanol Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS), biodiesel recently has enjoyed three big wins.The Senate Appropri...

USDA will release its August production estimate and supply/demand (WASDE) numbers this Friday, 10 August. This might be one of the most important producti...

General Comments For the first time this growing season, the trade came back to work Sunday evening and noticed that weekend rain across the Corn Belt was...

Sugar Prices Rally, Exports to Take a Hit The government finally has declared drought in at least four states: Karnataka, Haryana, Rajasthan and Maharashtr...

Optics or Impact If the perceived seriousness of the U.S. drought is reflected in this Friday's USDA WASDE report, pressure will increase on policymakers t...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

The Canadian Wheat Board (CWB) ceased to exist as a monopoly single-desk seller this week. It was the last of the single-desk government-sponsored sellers...

With all the hubbub over record crop prices and food inflation, we almost forgot to check in on the Federal Reserve's Wednesday meeting where the Federal O...

General Comments Markets were quiet overnight but started to pick up steam this morning when world financial markets rallied sharply higher. The rally in f...

WPI provides a summary of the week's futures price activity and the gains/losses experiences by grain, oilseed, and livestock markets. Additionally, today'...

SEA Case Study Two Southeast Asian neighbors are going to provide yet another example of which economic model works better: market capitalism or protection...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

PNTR: Congressional Democrats still refuse to schedule or vote for permanent normal trade relations (PNTR) for Russia, and Republicans refuse to vote for i...

The scorching heat of June and July, along with the scarcity of meaningful rains, has caused a drought over more than half of the 48 contiguous states. Unf...

Indian Soymeal Imports Seem Likely As I wrote on Tuesday, the Indian government is very concerned about the high price of domestic soymeal and the impact i...

General Comments For the second time in two days, markets were disappointed by the lack of specific actions by central banks to combat spreading economic s...

Disingenuous and Absurd Don't look for a cordial settlement when it comes to the issue of granting a Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) waiver, as requested las...

General Comments Yesterday it was noted that a pronounced level of profit-taking could become evident in futures contracts for the next week. Such activity...

Corn The old crop corn market did not suffer any big changes during the last week. There were a couple of sellers still willing to see demand out of Uprive...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

Russian Grain Market: 25-31 July 2012 GRAINS AND PRODUCTS The market trends last week were the same as the week before, with prices continuing to grow but...

The War Within It is no longer food versus fuel but food versus food in the debate over continuation of the ethanol mandate amidst the drought. Senator Cha...

General Comments The recent decline in trade volume for the the December 2012 corn contract is probably indicative of traders' waning interest in expanding...

News Updates EGYPT UPDATE The Egyptian government announced that the final amount of its wheat purchases from the local market is at 3.8 MMT, up slightly f...

While USDA will have the more definitive word on this year's U.S. corn crop with its 10 August WASDE, estimates from private analysts are shrinking the cro...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

Controversy today heightened over the House Republican leadership's decision to move the farm bill process via a one-year extension of the farm bill. Many...

India Considering 10 Percent Export Tax on Soymeal The Indian Ministry of Agriculture has proposed imposing a 10 percent export tax on soymeal for at least...

A week or so ago we wrote about how farmers will not suffer significant financial losses because of the drought. In fact, it is extremely likely that net f...

General Comments Markets opened much stronger than expected Sunday afternoon and continued to maintain that strength through the night and into today. Corn...

Drought Is Inevitable, Overall Rainfall Deficiency Remains at 22 Percent "Drought is inevitable, and the situation in August may not improve," said a farme...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

Tomorrow the House Rules Committee will meet to consider a rule for a one-year extension of the 2008 Farm Bill that "with certain modifications and excepti...

Ethanol Politics The U.S. drought is putting the heat on both crops and the biofuels mandate. Livestock groups asked the Environmental Protection Agency (E...

Back on 31 May WPI updated its world wheat production table and talked about how world wheat supplies were tightening. We wrote that there were still some...

Game of Chicken over Russia Republicans and Democrats are playing a game of chicken over passage of permanent normal trade relations (PNTR) for Russia. U.S...

There is a lot of discussion about the possibility of a Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) waiver this summer should, say, the August WASDE, come out with a sig...

General Comments Markets started very tentative again yesterday afternoon following another day of sharp losses in the soy complex. The selling dried up qu...

WPI provides a summary of the week's futures price activity and the gains/losses experiences by grain, oilseed, and livestock markets. Additionally, today'...

Milling Wheat The market in the Black Sea is quiet since import demand in the major destinations is very slow. Black Sea wheat remains nominally the cheape...

Meatless USDA Says Livestock "Wastes Resources" As if having a secretary who seemlingly plans to jawbone the markets into believing that the July WASDE sti...

Soybean Export Sales Higher Than Expectations Today's USDA export sales report showed U.S. exporters sold more soybeans and soymeal in the week ending 19 J...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

Extremism Deserves the Law Slander: The Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) is making a frontal attack on Monsanto by running billboards in Washington that...

The destructive U.S. drought of 2012 grabs all of the headlines, but it is not the only drought being inflicted on an important grain producing region of t...

General Comments Traders apparently were impressed today by the big green blobs that were shown by weather radar. The green blobs indicate where precipitat...

General Comments Grain and soy prices began a rebound in overnight trade after the very sharp price break with which markets began the week. The rebound co...

Farm Bill Intrigue The Senate has had its say on a 2012 Farm Bill, but on the House side negotiations are hot and heavy over whether it can even pass a sim...

Corn Because of bad weather conditions in the United States and their subsequent effect on corn crop conditions, CBOT continued its rally. The CU12/CZ12 sp...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

Russian Grain Market: 17-24 July 2012 GRAINS AND PRODUCTS Weather Conditions Because of the lasting drought, a state of emergency has been introduced in th...

It is late July and here we are again in the U.S. crop forecasting season. During the next few weeks we will hear numerous predictions of the size of the c...

One of the issues looming over the congressional schedule, budget and the presidential election is the expiration of the Bush tax cuts. These taxes are set...

News Updates As crops in many countries -- from the U.S. through Southern and Eastern Europe -- have been affected by poor growing weather, grain prices ha...

General Comments It was more of the same -- "down and dirty" grain and soy markets. Yesterday's steep declines set up bearish technical signals that no dou...

Insensitive Ethanol Rhetoric While it is still possible that this year's U.S. corn crop will be sufficient to satisfy all users, there is a growing list of...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

U.S. Soybean Crop Condition Continues to Deteriorate Yesterday's USDA crop condition report indicated the overall condition of the U.S. soybean crop contin...

Japan Trade Deals Like U.S. agriculture, EU agriculture is hopeful for a trade deal with Japan. EU officials anticipate that a free trade agreement (FTA) w...

General Comments Grain and oilseed markets were supposed to open higher Sunday on another very hot and very dry weekend across the U.S. Corn Belt, but that...

The Grain Complex: Situation Grim But Under Control Though there are many who would want the government of India (GOI) to ban exports of grains and oil mea...

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Virginia) released the House floor schedule on Friday, 20 July. The farm bill was nowhere to be found. This means that...

The hard red spring wheat tour is scheduled across the Northern Plains this week. The only problem is that the spring wheat harvest started last week and t...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

Markets are trying to take a breather from the super rally. We are also hearing another round of "bear" talk, most of which is garbage. Here are some of th...

Milling Wheat The Black Sea milling wheat market was sharply higher for the sixth consecutive week. The offers in the FOB market are difficult to find, but...

General Comments The weather market today intensified again with no rain and very hot temperatures in store for most of the central and western Corn Belt f...

Ag commodity markets obviously are on a bull tear that is driving food inflation, but that high level of agri-food inflation may be masking some of the inf...

Drought, Ethanol and Economy Respondents to WPI's online survey leaned a bit pessimistic on the economy (see graph below). Meanwhile, the drought may not p...

WPI provides a summary of the week's futures price activity and the gains/losses experiences by grain, oilseed, and livestock markets. Additionally, today'...

General Comments It has seemed inevitable since early July, but today it happened. CME September corn set a new record high for corn futures of $8.1675. Au...

No Ethanol RFS Waiver There have been rumors that an ethanol waiver is in the works because of the drought situation and skyrocketing corn prices. We previ...

This has been a tough nine-month stretch for derivative industry regulators. In just about the time they had dealt with the fallout from one major scandal,...

Pre-Emptive Ethanol Action Scuttlebutt is that at least part of the ethanol industry may decide to request a temporary waiver or a temporary lowering of th...

Corn The week started out with a lot of demand for Argentine corn at -40 CU for August and September shipments, but only a few sellers were willing to push...

Rainfall 26 Percent Below Normal in India's Key Soybean Area Information released today by the India Meteorological Department indicated that the cumulativ...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

Russian Grain Markets: 11-16 July 2012 GRAINS AND PRODUCTS Harvest Update On 16 July the Russian Ministry of Agriculture lowered its harvest forecast to a...

Trade Amendment Free-for-All The U.S. Senate Finance Committee markup of trade bills today reflects a lot of pent-up political anxiety, much of it misdirec...

General Comments It has begun to feel as though we have been trapped in a drought-driven market since forever. Of course, that is not true. However, it is...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

Last Friday (see WPI 13 July) we wrote that it is up to the House Republican leadership to devise a strategy to deal with scheduling the farm bill. Here's...

General Comments We suppose today's market was the drought version of "Turnaround Tuesday." Instead of running 20-30-40 cents higher like Monday's market d...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

Trans-Atlantic Differences In considering a Trans-Atlantic free trade agreement (FTA), one has to assess the impact of the divergent views on many issues b...

News Updates On the new business side of things, there is little or nothing to report this week as buyers are staying out of the market in the hopes that p...

Soybean Condition Declines, But Not as Much as Corn Yesterday's USDA report on the conditions of U.S. soybeans and corn indicated the condition of soybeans...

We apologize for raising the subject of the U.S. drought again, but these days what else is there to discuss? Simply put, the severe and ongoing drought ac...

General Comments Markets opened much stronger than expected Sunday afternoon. The following statement from a private weather forecaster accurately sums up...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

Monsoon Continues to Lag; Contingency Plan Needed After the spurt of rain in the past week (5-11 July 2012) the monsoon was 1 percent above normal, but the...

The drought across the U.S. Corn Belt is getting worse, not better. Weekend rains were far more scattered than expected and the 10- to 14-day outlook looks...

There are a lot of policies and political factors weighing in on the 2012 Farm Bill. These include spending levels for the nutrition programs, the structur...

Here is a rundown of the amendments adopted by the House Agriculture Committee during its markup on Wednesday.As indicated by the number of voice votes, no...

General Comments Markets of every sort were stronger today with financials posting big gains on somewhat better-than-expected news from China and strong U...

WPI provides a summary of the week's futures price activity and the gains/losses experiences by grain, oilseed, and livestock markets. Additionally, today'...

Milling Wheat The milling wheat market in the Black Sea is extremely firm with very limited volume offered in the export market. Russian wheat nominally re...

By now, there can't be anyone involved in agriculture who is not aware that the crop production situation in the U.S. has undergone a quick and extreme tur...

Winning without Trying U.S. aggies are astonished and pleased while the owners of a handful of worn out U.S.-flagged ships are baffled and angry over the t...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

General Comments In overnight trade and again during the day session, it was a battle between technical bears and weather-driven bulls. Although technical...

Farm Bill Livestock Amendments A few key and non-key livestock related amendments were adopted yesterday in the House Agriculture Committee's farm bill mar...

To badly paraphrase Shakespeare, these are the days that try men's nerves and wallets. We refer to the nerves and wallets of everyone throughout the agricu...

Most of the attention yesterday by the trade press about USDA's July supply and demand report focused on corn. The 20-bushel reduction in USDA's yield esti...

The bullish tone of USDA's July WASDE surprised many observers. USDA lowered its projected corn and soybean yields and production more aggressively than ex...

Russian Grain Markets: 3-10 July 2012 Grains and Products As of 9 July 2012, Russia produced 8.3 MMT of grains with an average yield of 2.59 MT/ha. Accordi...

Corn South American corn premiums continue to drop, staying at -25/-30 CU for August/September. Some trades were reported at those levels, while several in...

Policy Impacts of Drought Today's WASDE report from USDA, with its sharp cut in corn yields, is having several important tangential policy impacts: Ethan...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

General Comments "Buy the rumor, sell the news" is a fairly common reaction to important reports from USDA, and it certainly applied to today's market. Mar...

General Comments 'Twas the day before the July WASDE and futures trading was dominated by a Turnaround Tuesday and pre-report profit taking mentality. The...

Soybean Condition Worsens, But Can Rebound With Good Rains Yesterday's crop condition report indicated the condition of the U.S. soybean crop deteriorated,...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

News Updates As prices continue to rally for all grains, oilseeds and protein meals, export buyers are staying as far away from the market as possible in t...

As the House Agriculture Committee convenes its farm bill markup tomorrow, there is some recent data about farm-based perspectives on the bill that is inte...

Dragging Economy Down Last week's U.S. employment report was more than just a bummer for President Obama; it prompted a wave of negativity on the economy a...

We are just three weeks into summer in the Northern Hemisphere, and to put it mildly, the summer already can be classified as highly unusual for all things...

USDA will release its WASDE updates this Wednesday, 11 July, at 7:30 a.m. This could be one of the more interesting supply and demand reports since back in...

The Need for Biotech in India Many experts, including those in the private and public sectors, believe that Indian farmers and consumers would be better of...

Drought Impact on Ethanol December corn continued its daily leap, heading ever closer to $8.00/bushel. Muktadir Rahman of Capital Economics says that if th...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

General Comments What more can we say about these markets, other than that we are in a full-blown weather market in the U.S. with some help from more adver...

Day Late and... After years of talk, the UN Food & Agriculture Organization has an initiative to develop a common standard for measuring livestock agri...

Wheat, corn and soybean prices soared this week as crop condition ratings showed much greater declines than expected in last Monday's weekly report. This w...

WPI provides a summary of the week's futures price activity and the gains/losses experiences by grain, oilseed, and livestock markets. Additionally, today'...

General Comments Markets were weak in the overnight session and that weakness followed through until the close at 2:00 p.m. Outside market factors were bea...

As Gary Blumenthal wrote last night, the House Agriculture Committee released its version of the 2012 farm bill, called the Federal Agriculture Reform and...

Brazil Raises Corn Crop Estimate, Keeps Soybeans the Same Brazil's crop supply agency (CONAB) today raised its forecast for the 2012 Brazilian corn crop by...

General Comments There were two signs of official concern over slowing economies from different parts of the globe today. First, China's Central Bank dropp...

Beef Drought Looking at the cattle section of the table above (Livestock and Poultry Inventories), we see a huge increase in overall cattle receipts. USDA...

Having endured four days of 100-degree Fahrenheit temperatures without electric power, and of course without air conditioning, as a result of the powerful...

Russian Grain Markets: 26 June – 2 July 2012 Harvesting Updates GRAINS AND PRODUCTS As of 4 July, according to the Russian Agriculture Ministry, Russia har...

Whispered RFS Changes Nearby corn settled at $7.73 today and December at $7.08, implying to some that the new crop is around 145 bushels per acre, not the...

Corn Corn basis in Argentina continued to drop during the last week. Shipments for 15 July, August and September are offered at -15 CU, a 45-cent discount...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

Here is a snapshot of some key ethanol and biofuel issues. China Drops DDGS Anti-Dumping Case China late last week announced that it is dropping its invest...

The Future of the Americas’ Ag Dominance Africa and the former Soviet Union have agricultural potential, but factors favor the Americas as continuing...

Big New Crop Soybean Sale Indicative of Buyer Concerns about U.S. Crop Yesterday USDA reported that an exporter last Friday or over the weekend made a sale...

News Updates EGYPT UPDATE The International Monetary Fund (IMF) said that Egypt's change of power will have no effect on the financial institution's plans...

Tomorrow night will see the usual array of Independence Day fireworks displays across the U.S. (except where they are cancelled due to heat, extreme drynes...

General Comments The need for ample soil moisture during corn pollination, combined with the decline in soil moisture levels from abnormally dry to excessi...

Tutti Frutti TPP While USTR denied U.S. Congressional Chairman Darrell Issa (R-California) "observer" status at this week's Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP)...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

EU Eyes TPP A Reuters report indicates interest by both Brussels and the Canadian dairy, poultry and egg sectors in how Ottawa handles the start of Trans-P...

We haven't had a true 4 July weather market in years. In fact, it has probably not been since the last widespread mega-drought in 1988. That particular dro...

General Comments Weather, weather, weather. It was a super hot weekend across nearly all of the U.S. The East Coast, especially the Washington, D.C. area,...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

Higher Feed Prices Affect Margins for Small Poultry Farmers Corn prices in the state of Andhra Pradesh reached a high of $232/MT, while soybean meal reache...

With Congress adjourned for the Independence Day recess, it's worthwhile to provide an update on the political landscape against which the farm bill will b...

Today's long-awaited quarterly stocks and acreage revisions did contain a few surprises, but the surprises were not significant enough to outweigh the ragi...

Farm Boy Media Darlings Here's something lighthearted for a Friday afternoon. The Peterson brothers, Greg, Nathan and Kendal, three young farm kids from Ka...

General Comments Much of today's market excitement was not the result of the USDA's quarterly stocks and acreage numbers; it was the result of yet another...

China Aids Mercosur China wants more competition amongst food suppliers and greater food security. During Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao's swing through South...

WPI provides a summary of the week's futures price activity and the gains/losses experiences by grain, oilseed, and livestock markets. Additionally, today'...

Milling Wheat The market in the Black Sea is firmer without much activity. Russian wheat is about $10 higher versus last week, and French and U.S. wheat pr...

General Comments Grain and soy futures market closes across the board are red, but not by large amounts. The losses are generally single digits. Traders we...

In his policy comments last Monday (see WPI 25 June) Gary Blumenthal very briefly touched on the summary report issued by the Department of Justice (DOJ) o...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

Pork Gap Looking at the slaughter chart above, we can see that hog slaughter numbers are down again, having pretty steadily come in below 2 million head si...

Paying Twice A House Agriculture Committee markup of the farm bill is scheduled two weeks from now, and while consideration by the full House remains uncer...

U.S. Soymeal Exports Sales Now Ahead of Last Year Today's USDA export sales report once again indicated U.S. exporters made large export sales of soymeal l...

General Comments Volatility reigned in grain and soy futures trade as the market exhibits an increasing nervousness over USDA's acreage and stocks reports...

"A Mediocre Farm Bill," featured in the Sunday edition of The New York Times, opined on the Senate's version of the 2012 Farm Bill. Just for fun, we took a...

Russian Grain Markets: 19-25 June 2012 GRAINS AND PRODUCTS Planting and Harvesting Updates According to the Russian Ministry of Agriculture, the target are...

Russia PNTR Likely The White House and Congress continue to tussle over the passage and possible inclusion of the so-called "Magnitsky" bill in the grantin...

Corn Corn basis in South America continues to be weak. July shipments at the beginning of the week in review were buyable at +30 CU (or -10 CN with the CN/...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

As Mike Krueger noted yesterday, among the 1 June quarterly stocks estimates that USDA will release this Friday, 29 June, the quarterly corn stocks number...

China Proposes FTA with Mercosur China's President Wen Jiabao yesterday suggested that China and the countries of the Mercosur bloc consider negotiating a...

General Comments This is what a weather market looks like, and there is no doubt that we are in one. Yesterday's weekly crop condition reports dropped corn...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

News Updates EGYPT UPDATE The Egyptian government has announced that the budget for 2012/13 wheat purchases has been set at $2.65 billion (EGP 16 billion),...

G-20 Ag Plan In contrast to the Rio+20 meeting last week, G-20 members meeting in Mexico agreed to an actual plan for boosting food security in poor countr...

This week will be one of Washington's busiest of the year. Congressional members are facing a Saturday, 30 June deadline on the highway bill. Potentially m...

Justice Hears "Voices" In 2010 the Antitrust Division of the Justice Department orchestrated four field hearings to receive the griping from small and inef...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

General Comments Markets started very strong in the Sunday evening session and built on that momentum right through today's session. Note that the open out...

Wheat Procurement Increases, Exports Catching Flak India reaped 90.23 MMT of wheat in the 2011/12 season. According to new records, wheat procurement has r...

USDA will release two important reports on Friday morning, 29 June. The first is the quarterly stock estimate and the second is the revised planted acreage...

WPI provides a summary of the week's futures price activity and the gains/losses experiences by grain, oilseed, and livestock markets. Additionally, today'...

General Comments It was a very quiet day from a news perspective. Following yesterday's debacle, financial markets were steady early but then gradually gai...

Milling Wheat The weather in Russia remains one of the main concerns in the Black Sea region. Most operators are now evaluating the Russian wheat crop at o...

Every week seems to be a key week in markets these days, but next week has the potential to be especially important for several reasons. Markets can't ig...

With the Senate's passage of its farm bill on Thursday, attention has been turned to the House. House Ag Committee Chairman Frank Lucas (R-Oklahoma) expres...

Notes on Farm Bill Amendments The U.S. Senate's consideration of various amendments to that body's 2012 Farm Bill deserves some commentary.Biotech Labeling...

The Senate today passed its version of the farm bill by a vote of 65-34. The following is a description of the bill and a list of amendments and how they w...

Big Jump in U.S. Soymeal Export Sales Today's FAS Exports Sales report indicated U.S. exporters last week sold 258,700 MT of soymeal for shipment in 2011/1...

Based on observation and experience over many years, we have concluded that people involved in grain futures markets generally prefer bull markets to bear...

General Comments Rains fell in sometimes heavy amounts over the Northwestern Corn Belt with Nebraska, the Dakotas, western Iowa and Minnesota the primary b...

Diplo-Speak The WTO Agriculture Committee met yesterday and discussed various members' perceived indiscretions by other countries, with questions posed and...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

It seems that traditional Chinese medicine is primarily concerned with harmonious interaction of the body with the outside world. Herbs and foods are perce...

Farm Bill: What Didn't Happen to Livestock The Senate completed action on the farm bill today. The biggest news for the livestock sector is what didn't get...

General Comments Overnight trade in grain and soy futures found soybeans enjoying support from more non-commercial buying while grains traded in mixed fash...

Farm Bill Update The Senate slogged through more amendments today, ending certain payments to millionaires and capping marketing loan gains for all farmers...

Activity in the Chicago SRW wheat market spilled over into those for HRW and HRS wheat futures. Changes in the soybean, soyoil, and soymeal futures point t...

Corn Despite weaker premiums, the Argentine corn market was very quiet during the last week. On the selling side, premiums were downgraded 5-8 cents a bush...

Russian Grain Markets: 12-18 June 2012 GRAINS AND PRODUCTS Planting and Harvesting Updates Wheat harvest forecasts are getting worse as the dry weather con...

Today's closing prices for the first six listed futures contracts for major grain, oilseed, and livestock contracts are shown along with their price change...

Sustainability of Gab Fabs The Rio+20 Environment Conference is set to begin in its namesake Brazilian city tomorrow. The event is concurrently described a...

Dryness in Midwest an Increasing Concern for Soybeans If there ever were a year when the U.S. needs to harvest a large soybean crop, this is it. After the...

General Comments Markets had plenty to trade on today. There were the pro forma encouraging statements from the G-20 meeting in Mexico that eurozone leader...