Tag Archives Commodities

How’d you like a higher dollar? Well, you’ve got one. This morning the Bank of Canada upped its trend-setting interest rate by a quarter-point to 0.75 percent. That means almost all floating rates will immediately increase and other interest rates be affected, although longer rates generally have the least direct connection. And it means that […] Read more

Everyone in the world of grain – especially farmers – has been slapped upside the head by the wildness of the crop markets in recent years. From the lows of the early 2000s through the sky-highs of 2008 to the following crash and recovery, grain and oilseed prices have been volatile. How do you hedge […] Read more

This week The Western Producer unveiled its very own cam girl. Say hello to: The Western Producer Cow Cam. (This is fully family-appropriate viewing and something I’m looking forward to showing to my young daughters.) This cam carries footage of 17 minutes in a day of the life of Raven, a five year old purebred […] Read more

When I was 14, I bought an old shortwave radio from a friend. It looked like this one: I remember stringing a long wire out my window and along the frames of the other second floor windows in our house in order to pick up far off signals. I’d wiggle the controls around, wade through […] Read more

Anyone remember Charles Erwin Wilson? He’s the guy who (sort of) said “What’s good for General Motors is good for the country.” (It was a longer, more involved sentence, but the gist we remember is true to its intent.) Well, here’s something that looks a bit like the chart version of that view in prairie […] Read more

Today’s not a great day, if you’re wheat. Your value just dropped about 12 cents per bushel. That’s the biggest big crop result from today’s USDA report in a bad way. U.S. all wheat ending stocks are estimated at 43 million bushels above what USDA thought last month, and new crop wheat stocks should be […] Read more

This canaryseed imbroglio has me madder than a hatter with twice the blood-mercury level. Mexico is blocking canaryseed imports from Canada over apparent concerns about noxious weed seeds. Apparently the concern is that some Canadian canaryseed seeds got planted and up bloomed some nasty weeds. I’ve heard wild buckwheat named as a particularly unwanted weedy […] Read more

Conditions in Spain and Germany are going to radically change in about eight hours time: one’s going to experience euphoric celebration; the other’s going to suffer ignominious defeat. It all depends what happens in their World Cup semifinal matchup this (Wednesday) afternoon. I’m going to view this as a competition between financially profligate southern Europe […] Read more

Quick – someone come down to the bustling Winnipeg bureau of The Western Producer and give me a slap in the head. The onset of hot temperatures, tornado warnings, Canada Day, a royal visit and a mosquito-free weekend appears to have made me stupider than usual. In fact, I can hardly remember last week’s USDA […] Read more

“Overall, this report is going to fundamentally change . . . how people at look at markets.” That’s what one Chicago grain market analyst described the USDA’s stocks and crop production reports this morning, which found that corn stocks are now lower than even the lowest trade guesses, and that acreage is also below estimates. […] Read more