Week of January 12-18

Here is what’s going on in the Agriculture Industry this week…

We have one article from January 16th, 2020 by The Daily Times. The title of this article is “Money & Markets.” This article is just a little chart out of the newspaper. The numbers on the chart show the prices of fuels, metals, and agriculture.

Here are the results:

Fuels-

• Crude oil (bbl) – decreased $4.93
• Ethanol (gal) – decreased $1.33
• Heating oil (gal) – decreased $3.65
• Natural Gas (mm btu) – decreased $0.97
• Unleaded gas (gal) – decreased $4.26

Metals-

• Gold (oz) – decreased $0.92
• Silver (oz) – decreased $1.24
• Platinum (oz) – decreased $0.72
• Copper (lb) – increased $0.53
• Palladium (oz) – increased $2.34

Agriculture-

• Cattle (lb) – decreased $0.13
• Coffee (lb) – decreased $2.66
• Corn (bu) – decreased $0.07
• Cotton (lb) – increased $ 0.19
• Lumber (1,000 bd ft) – increased $0.66
• Orange juice (lb) – decreased $0.69
• Soybeans (bu) – increased $0.35
• Wheat (bu) – increased $0.45

In conclusion, as the article says, “Oil and gold prices dropped sharply as tensions between the U.S. and Iran eased overnight. Other commodities like natural gas and silver also fell.”

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Our second article is from January 17th, 2020 by The Daily Times. The title of this article is “Agriculture trade in Mexico.” This article basically talks about how trade all year of 2019 was difficult because of the weather. Hundreds of thousands of acres of crops were destroyed either because of flooding or drought. The head of the trade market believes that these weather conditions could be the cause of these huge decrease in the price of the trade products. We are expecting this to change since we recently signed an agreement with Japan that will provide improved access to the Japanese market. The article continues to go on by saying, “Canada and Mexico are among the most important markets for the U.S. Ag exports, and these exports are also expected to increase.” In conclusion, with the new agreement signed, our trade market is expected to increase greatly for the better.