As summer begins its last hurrah and ranchers anticipate the fall run, the underlying factors of supply and demand are still supporting cattle prices. But very large, global shifts in markets and economic stability are causing all sorts of fallout for grain and oil markets — how long before those macro trends pressure cattle prices?… Read More
Category: Markets
The grains complex continues to deal with decent growing conditions, better than expected yields, and a tougher global markets environment. This week we saw the market volatility index spike to levels not seen since last year when Russia was invading Ukraine (translation: market participants are pulling dollars out and parking it in cash positions as… Read More
There will be less wheat and slightly less canola grown in Canada this year than what analysts were expecting, if the first production estimates from Statistics Canada are to be believed. Prior to the report’s release on Friday morning, trade guesses for total wheat production ranged from 24.8 to 27.1 million metric tonnes. StatsCan pegged all-wheat at 24.6MMT, down 15.9 percent from last year…. Read More
A guest column by Frayne Olson, Crops Economist at North Dakota State University A farmer recently asked a very simple but extremely relevant question at a market outlook meeting: “Will I ever see high grain prices again in my lifetime?” The farmer asking this question started his farming career in the early 1980s and remembers the low commodity prices… Read More
Grain markets this week took a hard tumble as, on Wednesday, the USDA performed a dramatic leg sweep of the market with their August WASDE report. It completely blew most expectations out of the water as to where supply for the 2015/16 year sat. Instead of U.S. corn and soybean yields dropping to 164.5 and… Read More
The USDA took grain markets by surprise with the numbers in its August supply/demand report on Wednesday morning. Corn, soybeans and canola futures dropped sharply following the much larger than expected production and ending stock estimates. Soybean ending stocks for 2015-16 were pegged at 470 million bushels — up from the USDA’s estimate of 425 million, and significantly higher than… Read More
There’s been renewed interest in using producer cars to ship grain to customers in recent years, in part due to the backlog in the Western Canadian grain handling system following the bumper crop in 2013, as well as the entrance of new grain buyers after the end of the Canadian Wheat Board’s monopoly in 2012. As… Read More
Grains this week were a bit boring as rain landing in most growing areas across North America and even Australia prompted a few estimate increases despite the lingering threat of an El Niño. Friday did bring some action as a lower U.S. dollar and some strong U.S. export sales helped pull the complex higher for… Read More
First its monopoly was removed, and now the name will be history too. The Canadian Wheat Board (or CWB) formally became a private grain company known as “G3 Canada” today. G3 Global Grain Group — the joint venture between Bunge and the Saudi Agriculture and Livestock Investment Company — completed the $250 million acquisition of a… Read More
Grain trade this week was quite choppy as the usual suspects of weather, currency swings, and #harvest15 firing up being exacerbated by the closing of the month of July (meaning funds and other speculators may have looked to clean up their books a bit). Monday might’ve been the worst as front-month contracts for soybeans and… Read More