Agricultural Markets and Situation Outlook Webinar: July 16, 2026

[music] I'd like to welcome everybody to the July 2026 edition of the NDU Extension Agricultural Market Situation Outlook Webinar. Uh my name is Dave Riplinger, bio energy economic specialist with NDCU Extension and the regular host of the webinar. Uh this webinar is a regular program of NDU extension. We're targeting farmers and other aggra business professionals who want to know more about the current and possible uh market conditions and how they might impact North Dakota's economy. But with that, I'll go ahead and turn it over to Frank. >> All right. Fantastic. Thanks again everybody. Uh so today I'm I'm broadcasting from May not uh yesterday I was participating in the North Central Research Extension Center uh field days and gave a brief market update there. So, I'm I'm still on the road traveling um and and in broadcasting from why not today. Um here's my contact information. If you do have any questions or anything later on you want to visit about privately, I'd be happy to do that. Um so, let's just dive right in. I do have quite a bit of of stuff to cover that things are changing pretty rapidly and I want to make sure that we we get a chance to visit about it. So, just a real quick overview and summary. Um the July WASADY or the world agricultural supply demand demand estimates and the production report uh were supportive for corn and soybeans as well as for wheat. Uh we'll go through those numbers in just a little bit. There wasn't any really dramatic changes uh but they were all of the changes were supportive to prices. Uh weather conditions have been favorable in general for most of the US corn and soybean development. Uh, I'll give you an update on where that's at and and some some ideas on on things as we move forward. Um, obviously there's been a reescalation in the war with Iran. Um, the shipping delays through the straight as Hormuz continue to be uh indirectly impacting grain prices. I'll show you some some kind of graphics on on what's looking what it's looking like right now. Uh and then also the other thing that's been hitting the markets and especially supporting the wheat market is Ukraine and Russia have also intensified their uh conflict um and there's drones and bombing going on that's now damaged some ocean vessels uh in particular some Russian uh oil vessels um as well as some port facilities and some of the damage done to the port facilities in both uh Russia and Ukraine have been uh been attached to or part of the the grain delivery system. And so this is now creating some shipping challenges, a lot of uncertainty and some anxiety about what that might mean moving forward. So that with that, let's jump into the wisdom report. Those two came out at the same time. Um we'll start with wheat. So uh we're in the stage of the year now where we're getting wheat updates for for uh for yields uh not so much for planted and harvested acreage, but total production. Um this is a breakdown by class of wheat. First on the left hand side you look at all wheat and we start looking you know looking at the subasses in a minute. As usual what I've tried to do is provide the the first row of the top row in blue being what the the average trade estimate is. What is the trade expecting to see? Um this is done through a survey of private analysts and forecasters. Um and so from that survey of results we have the highest trade estimate, the lowest trade estimate and then the average. So the averages on top and blue towards the bottom and the highlighted black row is last month's numbers and then the red number on the very bottom is of course the number we got from the reports. So what I usually recommend to people is that they compare the blue blue row to the red row the top row versus the bottom uh simply because that's what the trade was expecting and if if the actual numbers were dramatically different from what the trade was expecting we usually get some kind of price movement. So for the all wheat number um the the trade was expecting some reductions. The the total reductions in all wheat wasn't quite as great as what they had expected but it was still definitely reduction. Um then from all wheat we break it down into all winter wheat. Uh that would be both soft red as well as as a hard um hard red winter. So if you look at all winter wheat again it was down from what the what the trade was expecting as well as down from last month. Again, not dramatic adjustments, but it's it's a tightening up of that production side. Most of the, you know, kind of the the problem or the issue as well as the reduction in production has come from the hard red winterw wheat area. We're starting to get much more solid yield reports coming from the winter wheat harvest. Um, I'll show you the wheat winter wheat harvest progress here in just a moment. Um, you know, general reports out of the hard red winter wheat country is that it yeah, it's very variable. uh some farmers are having normal or very close to normal yields while others are having complete disasters. So, it's it's very patchy and very spotty. The soft red winterw wheat area, which is really in that southern Illinois, Kentucky, Ohio region, there's some up into Michigan. Um the yields there are are better. They haven't been damaged nearly as hard as uh from the drought conditions. Uh but production did go down a bit from last month and the trade was expecting a slight reduction, which is what we got. uh the white wheat which is primarily growing up in the northwest uh Pacific Northwest area uh was they were expecting a slight a slight drop. We we basically unchanged in the in the white wheat uh in especially white winterw wheat area for other spring which would include primarily spring wheat. Um you know we didn't have an estimate from last month. So July is the first time that we got a formal estimate for for spring wheat total production. um that 470 million bushels um is about a let me look at my chart my graphics here is about a 4 and a half% reduction from last year. Okay. So, you know, we'll continue to watch this as it develops. Uh but there was a reduction and part of that of course is planted area was down some as well as uh yield estimates from last year. So, Durham uh very similar to what we had last year. Excuse me. It's a little bit lower than last year. I apologize. There's about an 18% cut from production last year versus the current forecast. Um there aren't a lot of private forecasters that estimate Durham and so I wasn't surprised to see that the trade estimate and the actual numbers were were were actually in my opinion pretty close. Um there were some differences but pretty close. Moving on to corn and soybeans. Again, we got an update in corn production and yield estimates. We weren't expecting any kind of yield est yield adjustments. That will come in August. So the August WASDY and the August production reports are going to be uh watched very closely. It's the first time we'll get some updates to the corn and soybean numbers on on the yield as well as uh planted acreage coming in from the FSA estimates. So we weren't expecting any major major changes in the in the production numbers. Um the adjustments that were made were were because of slight adjustments in the June uh perspective plantings report. So we knew that those acres were going to be accounted for. So again, the the industry number and the actual number were very very similar. On the soybean side, same kind of story. Uh we were expecting a slight increase in total production simply because we did have a few extra acres planted. Um so again, no no big shock or big surprises uh in in the corn and soybean numbers. Moving back to the ending stocks, we got right we're at the funny time of year where we have both uh old crop ending stocks as well as new crop. So we got two marketing years that we're still kind of monitoring at the same time. Now technically the uh wheat marketing year has ended. Um USDA has made some the final adjustments now to uh to consumption and ending stocks. Um so from now on now moving forward the the 92 million acre 90 92 million bushels excuse me will be the number that we use moving forward. So there were a few adjustments just to um the adjustments really came in some some tweaks to the seed feed and residual numbers and again th those are just some rebalancing based on the information we got. The same thing happened for corn. So at the end of June we got the the uh um grain stocks report um and based out the grain stocks USDA did make some small adjustments. They increased the feed utilization, the amount of corn going to the feed pile by about 150 million bushels. So by increasing the feed consumption, we they did reduce the ethanol consumption just slightly about 25 million million bushels. So a net net increase in consumption of about 125 million metric ton not million metric ton 12 mill 125 million bushels which then came out of ending stock. So the adjustments in the corn utilization is primarily because of the updates that we got from the information in the the quarterly grain stocks reports. Um on the soybean side u we really didn't have much of an adjustment. There was a slight increase about a 10 million bushel increase in USDA's forecast for total soybean exports. Again not a big adjustment. It wasn't really enough to move the marketplace. We were expecting some of those numbers. [gasps] Moving on to the new crop. So this is new crop ending stocks. So now we're going to take into include some adjustments in the production numbers as well as some adjustments in consumption. Again the trade was expecting for wheat a reduction in total ending stocks for all wheat. Uh again mainly because of the reduction in cut in winter wheat production. We did get that. Um it wasn't quite as large as what the trade was expecting but it's very very close. So again the numbers that came in uh from USDA versus the trade were very close. Corn there were a few surprises in the corn ledger um mainly on the consumption side. The exports number was increased by about 50 million bushels and again we had the increase from old crop. So just remember in the WASY report the old crop numbers the ending stocks for old crop become the beginning stocks for new crop. And so by reducing the old crop inventories that meant that we have fewer bushels coming into the system from last year and those bushels then flowed through to the bottom line. So most of the adjustment this reduction that we saw from what the trade was expecting versus what we got actually came from adjustments in the old crop numbers. And then on the soybean side uh again really everything was kind of a wash. There was some adjustment. There was a few increases, a few decreases, but everything basically washed out at the bottom bottom line. Again, not necessarily shock value in the marketplace, but all of the numbers that we got were supportive to to prices. Um, South America, we really didn't get any kind of adjustments except for the forecast for Argentine corn production. That did go up by about 2 million metric tons. Um, again, we were expecting that to happen. um private estimates that were were coming out of Argentina. The corn crop looks a little bit better than we had first expected expected. Um in for Brazil, no changes. Again, this is the crop that they just uh uh have basically um are finishing harvest. Now, we do have some second crop corn safrina corn crop in Brazil that has to be uh harvested yet, but we're getting some yield reports out and it looks as though the the expectations in the marketplace are being met. So, let's move to crop condition. Um, I pulled up a little bit different way of presenting the crop condition reports. This is also reported by USDA. You can look this up and and and search it yourself. On the very top, this top pane is what is the condition or what percentage of the crop is rated good to excellent. And if you if you listen to the radio, a lot of times they say, well, what portion of the crop is rated good to excellent? This shows the weekly numbers. That's the the line for each of the other previous years. And you can see where 2026 is here. This dotted line that runs down is is the most recent date, which would be uh July 12th. This comes out every every uh Monday uh Monday afternoon. So for 2026, the corn crop condition ratings uh this time last year were much higher than the what we're seeing today. Very close to what we saw in 2024. If you do notice, by the time we got into the harvest time period in 25, those condition ratings had dropped a little bit. So the moral of the story is corn condition ratings right now are pretty favorable. Uh they're pretty much you know in in a in the normal range. You can see in this what portion of it falls into each of these categories. And you can also see towards the bottom as far as the crop development where just just towards the front end of the silking or the the poll of the u yeah the silking stage where the the silks are actually coming out and pollination is beginning. for soybeans. Um kind of a similar story when when we look at 26 2026 condition ratings. A little bit lower than what we've saw saw over the last couple years, but definitely above or kind of yeah, slightly above the 5-year average. We're not that far off the midpoint. You can see also towards the bottom that we're about 40% bloomed right now. Uh which is pretty good uh typical progress, actually a little ahead of of normal progress for crop development. So, we're now getting into these the point is we're getting into this really critical reproductive phase for both corn and soybeans. The weather conditions into late July and into August are going to be pretty critical, everybody's going to be watching what's going on very very closely. So, if we do have some sparks in the market, some weather related rallies, you know, my my recommendation always has been if you see that kind of of of of occurrence, please take advantage of it from a pricing standpoint. For winter wheat, I just wanted to update everybody. The winter wheat 20 2026 winter wheat conditions have been miserable uh all basically all season. Um the reason for the gap is this is during planting and then we have the gap for the winter and then once it breaks dormcy. So you can see we're about 2/3 harvested. Uh the hard red winterw wheat area uh is about 2/3 harvested. The uh soft red winterwheat area is about 73 74% harvested. So, still have a little bit of winter wheat in the northern uh area. We've got into Montana as well as Pacific Northwest left. So, most of the Kansas crop is is being completed now. We're wrapping up in uh in Nebraska and Colorado. For spring wheat, um notice the 2026, the red line up here towards the top. Uh we're right in the middle of the 5-year average uh for for uh crop ratings. definitely down from 24 as well as 22, but we're above last year's numbers. Um, as far as p development phase, uh we're in kind of in the middle towards the tail end of the heading. Um, and and we should be starting into the flowering stages pretty quick here. So again, crop conditions are going to be uh weather conditions are going to be pretty important for um for seed development as we move forward. Let me move into some of the issues with the war. I just wanted to to give you a a geographic picture of what's going on in this interconnection between what happens with the grain markets as well as the energy markets. So this is a map that shows where is the winter wheat in Russia produced. So the darker the areas, the more more tons or bushels of winter wheat that are produced. And you can see here's Ukraine. Over here on the left we have the Black Sea towards the bottom left hand corner. Over on the right hand side we have the Caspian Sea. And this this little uh kind of this little side area is called this the Azovv sea or sea of Azov. Okay. Um so you can tell and most of the win most of the wheat that Russia exports is the winter wheat. The spring wheat production region is much more along this this vulga and eurals and into the Siberian region. So it's more along this border with Afghanistan. So the winterweed is really the one that gets exported pretty heavily. You can see these there's a series of rivers and I'll show you those in just a minute that are very very critical and important for getting that winterweed in in Russia to port very very cheaply, very inexpensively. So again, just for for geography, here's Ukraine, the Black Sea, Russia, and this is the Sea of Azov, and then the Caspian Sea over here. So here's a map now. Here's the Black Sea on the far right hand side would be the Caspian Sea, and here's the Sea of Azov. So you got two major rivers that are used for transporting grain. The Dawn River which is right here and this this shaded area is kind of the drain field for that. And then you have the Vulga River. Now the Vulga River flows in the Caspian Sea. It it winds its way all the way up towards Moscow. And there is a canal that's been um that's that's been um basically excavated cut excavated that connects the Vulga River to the Dawn River. So when it comes to grain transportation, they have some flexibility and it's actually possible to get um some of the product here in that's delivered or shipped across the Caspian Sea along the Vulga through this canal along the Dawn River to a key port here which is called Rosttov on Dawn. So it's the city of Rosttov on the Dawn River. And this port right here was one of those that was uh that was attacked and had some some damage. Now again, a lot of the damage that was done was to some of the the general port facilities, some of the uh energy loading facilities, but also some of the grain loading facilities. So this port right here is very very important and critical for the Russian wheat delivery. About 25% of the Russian wheat exports come through that particular port. So the fact that this has been damaged now is is important. I just wanted to show you some of the kind of geography what's going on. [snorts] Now this region also becomes important when it comes to energy and energy transfer as well. So I'm going to talk about that in a minute. So this is a map. I I kind of blew this up a little bit. That's why the resolution isn't the greatest. Um so just for geography again up here we have England. This is the Mediterranean Sea. This is the Black Sea right here. This would be uh parts of Ukraine. This would be Russia. Here's the Sea of Azov that I just talked about. And here's the uh Caspian Sea. So these little dots represent um vessels carrying petroleum products, crude oil, uh natural gas, gasoline, diesel fuel. And you can see the little dots here that are up river. So there are some transportation along this both the Vulga River and the Dawn River for energy as well. You can also see that there are some of these facilities along here that are that are I mean the vessels here that are also carrying uh energy products back and forth. Okay. Now here is the Red Sea and this is the Suez Canal. Over here on the right hand side this is the Persian Gulf and this is the straight of Hormuz. Okay. So you can see all of the oil movement that comes through this Mediterranean region. Now, the reason that's important is because now as we as the the um straight of Hormuz gets gets plugged up again and there's some concerns about what the flow rate of of vessels will be, um the Iranians are also uh asking the Houthies or um requesting the Houthis to be able to try and block the exit to the Red Sea down here. And so if they can do that, now you have two major uh flows, two major kind of transportation routes for crude oil that potentially have high risk um transits. Okay. So you have both not only the Persian Gulf but now also if the Houthis are able to to slow or stop traffic on this um at the outlet for the Red Sea could also be a significant issue. Now a lot of times we most of the focus is on energy. I understand that. Uh but the the shipping uh congestion that goes on through the straight of Hormuz. So again, this is the Persian Gulf. This is the straight of Hormuz. You can see all the vessels that are backed up on either uh on the outside wanting to get in, get reloaded, or on the inside that are loaded and wanting to get out. So the red dots, uh the excuse me, the the maroon dots, get it right. the orange dots, excuse me, the orange dots are for um the the energy products. Um let me oh uh the the blue dots are for for um container vessels and then the green dots are for other cargo vessels. So we have a lot of product that's flowing through that that straight and it's not just the energy markets. Okay, let me continue. So what does that mean for pricing? And we've seen some some rallies in the in the grain markets um primarily because of some of the connection into energy, the concerns about the transits in the in the Persian Gulf. Um you can see that that this was the runup that we got during the first part of the Persian Gulf War. This is the drop that we had um as as things began to settle and now we've get a recovery. Now again, this recovery is not 100% due to the the issues with Iran, but it's certainly providing some supportive uh uh pricing and a lot of that is the is the money flow. people that are exiting and getting out of some of their positions in the stock market because the stock market has been softening. Um transferring those monies that that um that those funds over into commodities primarily the energy stocks but a lot of the the commodity I mean the the people that are trading in the in the stock market often do not directly invest in the the uh energy markets. they they like would prefer to buy a commodity index or an index fund. And so those indexes are prepackaged, meaning they're a blend, a prepackaged blend or portfolio of commodities. And about 50 to 60% of that is energy. But by buying those indexes, you're also getting um grain in the form of wheat uh corn, soybeans as well as the meat products. So there's a connection not only through ethanol but also through this investment community and this rally some of the support that we're seeing in the excuse me support that we're seeing in the in the futures market for corn is also uh a spillover effects because of the investment uh um issues going on to soybeans. This is November soybeans. We've seen a nice rally or pop in the soybean market. Part of that is is the Middle East issues, but a lot of that is actually because of of China coming in and buying some US grain. Now, US soybeans specifically. Now, China, I want to be very clear, China has not purchased, they purchased soybeans. It's primarily for new crop, not old crop. And these purchases are very typical. And that's the point I want to make is that the volumes they're purchasing and the timing of these purchases are very common. They're very typical. This is usually what we would see at this time of year. So, the reason the soybean market is now being a little more supportive is is primarily because it's there were still some concerns. Would would China follow through on these promises to be able to buy uh come back and buy US soybeans like they have in the past. And so, some of that anxiety is starting to wear off and excuse me, if China does continue to buy at these rates, that would definitely be positive. it would be back to their normal purchasing habits on the wheat. Uh you know wheat has really taken a beating over the last several from from basically from planting into the first part of July. Some of this rally again it's a combination of two things. Num number one we're seeing um a slightly smaller winter wheat crop. Um winter wheat futures markets are actually above prices are actually above spring wheat futures prices right now. Uh some of it is is a spillover effects from the Iranian war. Uh but a lot of this a lot of especially over the last about two weeks has been because the escalation of the war between a um Ukraine and Russia. And so some of this again is very supportive. It's politically driven. It's it's world trade driven. And so we got to be very careful about um not not getting too excited. And my my best guess right now is for all of these major commodities that we will not see the spikes and the price levels we saw when the when the Iranian war first began, but it's definitely been supportive. So, I'm hoping that farmers get a chance now, especially for corn and for old crop corn and old crop uh wheat to be able to get some of those bushels sold and get that cleaned up. My last slide and then I'll hand things over to Tim Petri um is on canola. Um we've similar to soybeans, we've seen some some strength in the canola market. A lot of that's driven by the oil seed complex. Um the even though the um you know on the Canadian side, the last stat can report was showing that the the production and consumption and ending stocks this year are projected to be very similar to what we saw two years ago. And again, two years ago there there was a reasonably tight canola supply demand balance sheet. So, with that, I will stop. I'd be happy to to answer any questions when we get um when we get a chance to at the end. So, I apologize for taking so long. Tim, it's all yours. >> Good afternoon, everybody. Tim Petri, extension livestock marketing specialist. Again, like usual, not going to change things up very much. Just talk about the cattle market and a little bit about lambs and what's going on there. and really happy to follow frame because many of the things he said are affecting the cattle market as well. So, let's move along. Usually, I do start off with the cash market, but we're going to start off with the uh box beef here. And uh this this is what packers can sell their meat to into the wholesale channels or ultimately retail or whatever. And there's been some noise this week that you know that the cutout value went down. In fact, it went down uh $7 uh last week and uh so you know I listen to the radio and so on like you do and commentators oh you know the cycle is peaked and all this noise and so on. But I just want to assure you one thing here in that the cutout value going down and it's as we going to see in a minute itffect affects fed cattle too because there's a direct link there and what packers can sell their meat for it or what they can pay for producers. But I just want to assure you that this isn't, you know, some conspiracy to lower prices or anything unordinary going on because the cutout value usually does go down and you see that on the chart. It, you know, the last of three years and now this year it does go down this time of the year. It's a seasonal thing. We get the Fourth of July. You know, it peaks back earlier in the year, right before the holidays start with Memorial Day and Father's Day and all those big beef eating days and Fourth of July. But after Fourth of July is over, we get the dog days of summer now and not as many uh gettogethers and holidays and so on and again it's 100° out and humidity and all that. So the cutout does fall off. So this is you know not out of the ordinary. It it but it does affect the market and then you know you know then by again by the time we get to the later holidays get Thanksgiving out of the way and you know get some holiday buying you know that occurs. So uh but it does affect the the fed cattle market as we'll see. So, here is the fed cattle price chart. Just to to carry on before I explain in more detail, the fed cattle market went down $7 last week. Went down from 255 to 248. And again, if you know, if you listen to commentators and you listen to Chicago traders and so on, it's you know, again, it's like the sky is falling or something. But the cutoff went down. So the Fed steer price went down uh the same. And again kind of a seasonal thing. And you look on the chart that that happens as well. You know, we're still at record high levels on fed cattle up there at 248. And you know, so uh uh you know, still above last year. Uh now back to what FR was talking about when we get into the the the distant futures and you know that would be you know we're we're moving into our next our closest is August and then October and then the December futures are quite a bit lower than the current cash market. Again the futures market has fallen quite a bit. the futures market uh you know and and and compared to the cash market again the cash market is 248 and uh August futures are down there two 25 or something so there's a big decline there and uh but it's the just like fra talked about it's the uncertainty in the market the funds that he mentioned do not like uncertainty and they're worried about the Middle East and the gas prices were up, then they went down. Now they're going back up. Uh gas prices are a very very component to, you know, to beef prices because uh consumers, you know, have to get their kids to to school or to daycare and and people have to get to work and so they have to have gasoline to do that. And when the gasoline prices go up, uh you know, they fill the tank and then go to the grocery store. And so, you know, that that that's can impact beef prices. Hasn't had a huge impact yet, but you know, the again the funds are looking their their job is to predict the the um or see what the market will be in in the future. So, that's all part of it. You know, the the lots of other noise in the market affecting the futures market. I could go on and on and on. You know, the president's talking still talking about increasing beef imports and we've got the new world screworm which so far has not turned into a pandemic or anything. We got fewer 40 40 cases and you know seems to be you know you know somewhat under control although we do have a few cases in the US and you know we had packing plants closed down and now the Fort Morgan Cargill plant the employees are striking. So then we lose packing plant capacity and so you know that gets the funds all all worried about that and then like frame talked about we got weather issues and corn issues you know the price of corn as we'll see in a minute affects Peter cattle as well. So the the futures market there is risk off quite a bit lower. Uh the WASDY report that Frra mentioned last week came out and the the prediction for this year on the WASDY was still 251 for an average. Then when we go to next year, those orange squares in there are next year's futures, which again are very riskoff because that's a long ways out and a lot of things could happen. But USDA predicted even higher fed cattle prices this year of or next year and uh you know of of 254 a little above this year. So you know we'll have to see a lot of things can happen and there's a lot of noise in the market and so on but as of now we're still at record high prices and that's been supportive to feeder cattle. Here's our 550 to six weightight calf prices again and usually as you see on the chart this time of the summer they just kind of level off. there aren't very many being sold uh because you know their calves are out sucking on the cow and there just aren't uh many calves being sold and the market just kind of levels out there usually then in the fall when the market when the calves start coming to market it goes down I've talked to this month after month before that didn't happen last year it went up instead of going down in the fall but again looking at fed cattle prices and and You know, I think maybe we might return to a more normal seasonal pattern this year and some decline in prices. And again, it won't be any conspiracy or anything else. It's a normal seasonal thing. All those fundamentals that I have listed up there that I've talked about every time the last few months, uh, you know, were in play and so at least some of those may not be. And so that could cause weakness. And I'm not even going to show you the chart I showed last time where, you know, we could could to go down seasonally there, but we're still $100 higher than we were last year at this time at all-time record highs. Still a really good demand for for uh calves and and so on. Move to the heavier weight yearlings. Kind of the same story there is we're on, you know, we're $50 higher than we were last year. We've kind of been, and more on this in a minute, we've had fairly level uh prices there throughout the year. Uh you know, not not a lot of variation, but at record high levels. Again, the futures have taken a hit. More on that in a minute when I show you the chart in the in the fall futures there, the August, September, October, November futures. The trading down there 335 to 345 in in that area. Again, for all those reasons I talked about before, the futures market has just got the jitters and it's looking at the fed cattle market and uh and so on and then even risk off into next year as uh as well. But uh you know getting just to get into a little deeper of the situation there uh here's the September feeder cattle futures contract and then the CME cash settlement price. You know, and I've showed you I showed you this chart last time as well. And you know, what we've seen, of course, is a very volatile futures market. You know, uh you know, like I said, right down there around 345 today and and not much different than the last time I talked to you, but it went way up to 370 and back down to 345 in in and you know, in the last month. And you know there's there's where the futures were in May again around 350. In April they were way up around 365 and March we're down there at at 35 to 40 and so on. But like I told you last time the and you saw how level those uh 800 pound steer prices were that cash settlement price which is just all the uh uh you know 800 pound basically average 800 lb steers sold in in the US and this is daily. My other chart is weekly. So, this shows you a little bit more noise, but interesting. Go across from 370. They're 370 today. They were 370 in June. They were 370 in May. They were 370 in April. And they were 370 in March when the futures market has been all over the board for all those issues that that I mentioned and and that Frey mentioned. So, you know, I tell producers, you know, if you want to get ulcers and lay awake at night, watch the futures market. If you want to sleep good at night and so on, watch the cash market that has been has been resilient there. And you know, yeah, the futures market then has uh you know, is not that much different than a month ago, but it did go way up and go down. Again, Fra already talked about, you know, there's a opposite relationship between uh uh corn prices and and feeder cattle futures. Chain corn 10 cents a bush will change full cap price buck in the opposite direction. So there I've just kind of highlighted frame talked about why corn prices have went up there and in July or by the end of June and you see kind of interesting at the low there at the end of June and corn prices is the green line that was the high in feeder cattle prices. Now they've came down. There are other factors affecting it too, but you know, corn will be a big thing to watch uh into the future here because it certainly does affect both futures and and cra cash prices for for cattle. So I just want to mention that uh the July 1st beef cow inventory report down there in the black towards the bottom, USD is going to release the July 1st cattle inventory report uh next Friday. And so we're anxiously awaiting that. Again, the the uh the uh July numbers have went down for uh seven years. They didn't in 20 24 USD didn't do the survey because of of budget issues, but they did last year. So, we're anxiously awaiting that. I think we'll be within 1% either direction of last year. wouldn't surprise me for him to be down a percent or whatever or up a percent but we you know we got to wait to find that out. There's the website at the bottom that uh if you want to get that report and then next webinar I will report in detail what that report said and the ramifications what for what might happen there it is dry we you know we don't expect that that herd rebuilding started at all again it depends on if they go back and adjust numbers or whatever there's the current drought monitor came out this morning and a lot of cattle country what you know is dry in, you know, in Kentucky and Florida are the outlying states are number nine and 10 and it's dry in both of those states. And then of course the big states are Texas on up through North Dakota and Montana and and a lot of drought there. Although Texas, which was very, very, very dry just a month ago and now is flooding and got all kinds of rain down there. So they've improved a lot. But down at below you see that 44% of our beef cow herd is still in drought. So that's limiting any expansion plans and you know that's a short-lived recovery in Texas. So you know I talked to my counterpart down there just a few days ago. He said you no big plans for big you know heer keeping back and so on because you know you remember just a month ago it was so dry. So finish up with lamb prices like I usually do. again, they're just really really plugging along nicely this year. Even, you know, we've got short supplies of domestic lamb and very good demand there. And so again, in the lamb case there, we're trading $100 higher than we were and so on. So with that, I'm going to quit and uh and turn it over to Dave. >> Bio energy update. A lot going on. Obviously, Frra's spoken quite a bit about what's going on in the Middle East. uh repercussions for energy markets globally. Uh as we've talked about uh regularly over the last few months and you know actually over a year we are having record uh ethanol exports. Uh ethanol use globally is increasing uh prior to the the conflict in the Gulf. You know it was a it was a energy security issue to some extent um as well as you know looking for that most economical affordable way to to have fuel in different countries. I'm going to go through a few different stories uh internationally just to kind of highlight uh you know what's going on. Uh start in Brazil. Brazil is a very large producer and user of ethanol number two in both of those categories behind the US. Uh use sugar cane to produce ethanol as you spoke about you know earlier this year. There's an interesting play between sugar uh prices and ethanol prices um and also between the price of oil uh and and ethanol use. And here you know at the at the federal level the national level in Brazil an increase in the ethanol blend in gasoline to 32%. And so little bit of background in Brazil uh their vehicles can run uh anywhere between zero and 100% ethanol. Um, and so these adjustments are made, you know, by the government and then when you go to the gas station locally, uh, you know, that's what you have. You have the choice of E32 or E32. And of course, this, uh, uh, somewhat a modest rise, but again, a 32% blend uh, is is quite substantial. Uh, you know, in the United States, you wouldn't be able to do that, uh, with with EPA regulations uh, and the like, but you know, obviously Brazil is taking that step. [snorts] Um, next moving into over to Asia. Uh, in Indonesia a few years ago they they made this announcement that they were going to uh you know eliminate the you know the export of of oil or control or palm oil exports again to kind of keep things local uh to avoid food versus fuel and the like. uh they are not an oil producing country and so they're they're now up to a almost B50 blend. So 50% of their their diesel you know biodeiesel is is out there uh as a home uh for their oil but again in that case much more of a an energy security play. uh looking at India uh India has rapidly gone from having no mandate to a 20% mandate and in fact having excess ethanol uh in their system um which again a dramatic change. They were very concerned with food versus fuel as well as how corn and/or ethanol exports might impact local production. you know, kind of that that uh uh individual farmer impact on having, you know, access to these these markets where, you know, the US might be a, you know, be able to produce or supply at much lower costs. You know, they've hit and are now getting ready, you know, exceeding that E20 level, uh, which is, uh, causing some opportunities and also some challenges. A big piece of news there yesterday is they just had a court announcement where uh someone successfully sued an auto manufacturer because their vehicle failed uh again according to the court because it used E20. Um that's kind of remains to be seen. Uh little bit of a unique situation there too. But you you know you are seeing as a newer market as things grow out that that's one of the concerns a lot of folks have is you know is this an acceptable fuel? you know, does it cause problems? And in that case, the courts uh uh indicated that it does. Uh next, some really big news from earlier this week. There's been a lot of discussion uh and movement towards the use of ethanol as a marine fuel, you know, for for major uh international maritime uh transportation. Uh just this week we've seen uh the first you know wholesale movement into that market uh with a uh ship uh being fueled in Brazil uh with half a million gallons of uh in this case sugarcane ethanol. Uh you can see that that picture there is actually the picture of the actual vessel itself. So, a recently commissioned vessel that can run on a conventional fuel, which would be, you know, petroleumbased methanol or ethanol. Um, and so a lot of recent uh vessels that have been commissioned can run on methanol, consequently can run on ethanol. And that's really kind of this this movement that that we're seeing. Uh right now there's about 70 vessels worldwide that have that uh capacity with the expectation it's going to increase quite significantly in the next few years. Um just thinking about the implications of that the global uh marine fuel market for for international trade is about 84 billion gallons. So a little more than half of what the US gasoline market is. So you can imagine a 10% penetration of ethanol into that market would be another 8 billion gallons uh of ethanol use uh globally. So this has a lot of promise uh for being a a growth market for ethanol. And it's also interesting too in you know terms of Brazil you know at at the port in country you know they're they have an abundance of ethanol. So in many cases this could be driven by economics or that you know the financial bene direct financial benefits at the same time for those companies shippers uh you know if they do have that that interest in reducing emissions you know having a a a shipment fueled with ethanol you know may meet some some future goals that they have. Uh and just kind of expanding on that a little bit, I've talked a lot in the last few years about, you know, international efforts in aviation fuel. So we we talk about SAF, you know, sustainable aviation fuel and uh AO, which is the the international airline uh organization. Uh the IMO, which is the international maritime organization, is also working to decarbonize. And so this really fits within that that broader kind of shared goal of the industry. Uh and we'll see how that builds out. It's also, you know, like logistically a relatively straightforward thing to do because, you know, many ports. So for example, in the United States, if you go to the the US Gulf, uh you know, you have ethanol available. So the challenge of, you know, changing that from being a product for export to a bunker fuel, uh is pretty straightforward. Uh last thing I want to talk about uh is the recent release of technical guidelines from USDA for uh greenhouse gas emission scores for egg commodities. So this fits into the big 45Z discussion. So, one of the things we're, you know, we're waiting for is getting all of the pieces, the final rules for how farmers or how agricultural commodities might be able to be incentivized uh when used as a feed stock for for bofuels or for lowcarbon fuels. And so what the USDA just released a few weeks ago is guidelines for how this can be done using uh a tool that they released before. So that's that that carbon intensity calculator uh as well as some of the guidelines of of how you might do how how they would like reporting how they would like verification to occur. It's a bit unique because USDA is not the regulator for 45Z. um that's the IRS. Uh but obviously they have expertise that no other department has and this is a contribution or kind of you know solidifying of of part of what we're going to expect uh for that final rule uh when it's released. That's again expected to be in November. Uh another big piece that's important is that it did add canola. And so these were based on comments you know received uh previously updated. So instead of just having corn, soybeans, sorghum, you know, canola is now a feed stock, which is, you know, very helpful, promising for them. Uh [snorts] this is a really quick uh coverage. I'm not going to go into it as if it's a training. Uh but a screenshot of the calculator itself. Very straightforward Excelbased tool. uh you know drop-own boxes in terms of crops, the location and so you actually specify the county uh and some uh different pieces. So expected yield, actual yield. This needs to line up with what you report for for federal crop insurance uh and then different practices uh and the like. And at the bottom it'll calculate uh the estimated carbon intensity. Uh, and again, it's important to note that doesn't necessarily mean that that number would be used by the clean fuel producer and reported to the IRS for 45Z. But it's interesting because it's it it would I'm challenged to think that it would be much different. Uh, one of the big uh, things that the the technical guidelines that were released a couple weeks ago do is they do use mass balance uh, to to frame how this is done. And so to understand the difference between mass balance and book and claim and if you don't know these terms uh, now now's the first time to give you a chance to understand what they mean. So with mass balance, you're really tracking the specific bushel of corn or that that crop from the field to the fuel producer. It has to be that specific crop. So I want to know the carbon intensity of that specific bushel. Uh that's opposed to book and claim which would allow uh the farmer the bofuel company to not actually exchange or track what's going on with the physical commodity but rather allow the farmer to sell credits. And you know good way to explain this is to think about a jar of candy and I've got these different colors and some of these colors are are more desirable than others. Well, you know, you think that there's this mix and there are crops that have lower CI scores or higher CI scores. Well, for mass balance, you would have to actually have the candy that has the low CI score. You know, if if you needed 100 of those, all of them would have to be, you know, traceable back with that amount. uh for book and claim, you know, person could say, "Well, I've got, you know, 10 of them in here that have this this this attribute that you like that that you think is good. I'll give you I'll sell you the credit for those." Um, and that that will take care of the transaction. Again, it's not actually attached to that physical uh in this case, piece of candy. Um a lot of and if you think about the the benefits of that you know if I'm a farmer a lot of most uh folks in agriculture the biofuel industry would like to use book and claim it removes all of those costs and challenges with preserving identity of traceability and the like. U allows flexibility uh you know and you know makes marketing a whole lot easier. Uh but again, right now with the the technical guidelines released a couple weeks ago, they're still on mass balance. I don't know if that's going to change. I mean, there's a lot of folks who'd love to see book and claim uh for the reasons I just mentioned. Uh but that happening kind of remains to be seen. Uh so that uh is the end of my presentation and the end of our three talks for today. Uh we will be meeting again in about a month on the 13th of Thursday. Thursday, uh, August 13th. Um, and with that, happy to have any answer any questions or be engaged in any discussion that you guys might have. While we're waiting there, I don't know if I made it clear, but another thing I want to talk about on the livestock market that I wanted to make clear was, you know, there's still going to be a lot of volatility because both the feeder cattle and live cattle, the nearby futures are August. And in both cases, the cash market is over $20 higher than the current futures. So either one of them's going to have to change $20 or both change $10 or if the market's going up or down or whatever. So volatility is not over just because that those you know that that uh basis difference or that has to be zero uh with the cash settlement price and the in and the feeder cattle futures or the cash price in and the live cattle in the future. So hang on there's still going to be volatility. >> Is there going to be volatility in the crops markets or where we get >> Yeah. I I I think that's a pretty pretty safe bet that that yes, we'll have I I'm never going to work my way out of a job. I think there will always be things to talk about. [laughter] >> All right. Well, and I I don't see any any questions right now. Uh I I think we provided everyone an ample opportunity to do so. I want to thank Tim and Fra for speaking today. We'll be back in a month and I hope that everybody has an enjoyable day and doesn't get too hot or too smoked out. Thanks. >> [music]