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 Weather Service (NWS) should announce that July 2012 in the U.S. was the warmest July on record. NWS said that the average temperature for the 48 contiguous states during this past July was 77.6 degrees Fahrenheit. July 2012 just nosed out July 1936, a Dust Bowl year, by 0.2 degrees. In fact, the first seven months of 2012 have been the warmest first seven months for the lower 48 states on record. Putting the record warmth together with precipitation levels that are far below average for much of the country east of the Rocky Mountains, it is easy to understand why the 2012 drought has be...
What You Need to Know Today: Cattle futures extended their sharp selloff Friday as weakening cash cattle prices, deteriorating feedlot profitability, and reduced packer demand continued to weigh on the market. The inability of futures to sustain a rally following last week's bullish Cattle on...
As predicted, the Federal Reserve held rates steady at the last meeting before the midterm elections, likely in part because of the election (see WPI 19 October and 22 September). The decision comes at the tail end of a midterm election cycle that has been marked by the two parties campaigning...
Key Takeaways: WPI’s new EU rapeseed crushing margin models point to weaker processing returns over the next four months due to higher rapeseed procurement costs and weaker product values. Statistical forecasts call for German crushing margins to decline from €181/MT to €...
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.