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Last week, the agriculture markets started off on shaky ground for a reason that you may not at first suspect: Argentina’s presidential election. It’s no secret that the happenings in South America impact our commodity prices, but at first thought, it’s usually something along the lines of weather or crop production in Argentina and Brazil.

I think we have all noticed the increase in prices of everything from daily necessities like groceries and toiletries to unnecessary pleasures like Netflix and holiday decor. In true Thanksgiving spirit, I have been doing some research on the cost of this year’s turkey dinner and food inflation.

It has been kind of a strange month. When I think of October, I of course think of Halloween and pumpkins and fall colors, but much of my thoughts are consumed with a more relevant topic: harvest.

It’s becoming increasingly more frequent that I sit down to write this and I’m not sure at all what to say. This isn’t because of a lack of news, it is because there are so many ongoing situations and surprise events to keep track of—on top of the normal fundamental and technical details.

With the USDA Quarterly Stocks report now behind us, the next focus is on the October 12th World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates (WASDE) report, as well as US harvest progress and South American weather. Harvest across the United States is moving right along with mostly clear weather forecasts not causing any delays.

Over the last several weeks, the grain and oilseed markets have really struggled to hang on to any positive momentum. There have been moments of upside potential and others with even more concern to the downside.

China’s economy has been a global talking point for the past few decades, especially recently. After all, China is the world’s second-largest economy.

The end of the month can usually bring some volatility to the markets, and August was no exception. Five of the eight months in 2023 so far have brought some notable selloffs in the marketplace.

Continuing with the trend from last week, I’m going to talk a little bit more about South America and their global trade relationships. In recent years, the agricultural trade relationship between China and South America has grown significantly, with China emerging as a major importer of agricultural products from various South American countries.

I’ve mentioned before how things going on around the world can impact us right here at home, especially in the agriculture industry. South America is quickly becoming a major component in the world market.

Due to a few changes outside of anyone’s control, things may look a little different here. I don’t want to give anyone outdated information, and the best way I can think to do that is by focusing on the bigger picture instead of the day-to-day news and commentary.

We’ve all been hearing the buzz about Artificial Intelligence (AI) and the bots that could quite possibly change the world as we know it. I hadn’t played around with any of the chat bots, but I have been a little curious about them.

The grain and oilseed complex started this week out on a rough note. Between a cooler and wetter forecast in prime production areas and no major Russia/Ukraine updates over the weekend, there wasn’t much of anything to get bulled up on.

We have started yet another week with high volatility and a spike in the markets. The conflict in Ukraine has been going on for something like 17 months now, and throughout the duration of the war, we have seen a lot of back and forth on the status of the grain corridor agreement.

July is an important month in the grain markets. The big USDA acreage report gets released at the end of June, just before we approach a critical point in the corn growing season and begin to grow more confident in what the new crop will really look like.

There are a few key USDA reports every year that the trade keeps a close eye on. The June Quarterly Stocks and Planted Acres reports are a couple of them.