Ep. 11 Rate Shift: The Fed’s Bold 50 Basis Point Cut
Morning Coffee and Ag Markets Podcast
Media Contact
Mary Hightower
U of A System Division of Agriculture
(501) 671-2006 | mhightower@uada.edu
Welcome to Morning Coffee and Ag Markets!
Join Riley and Ryan on this episode of Morning Coffee and Ag Markets for your go-to source on the latest in agricultural markets and financial trends. In this episode, we dive into the recent updates on federal fund rates, exploring the implications of the Fed’s bold 50 basis point cut. Discover how this significant rate shift impacts not just the economy, but also the agricultural sector. We’ll break down the potential effects on commodity prices, lending rates, and overall market dynamics, all while enjoying our morning brew. Tune in for insightful analysis, expert opinions, and actionable takeaways to navigate these changing financial waters!
Riley Smith, Program Associate
Agricultural Economics and Agribusiness
rsmith@uada.edu
Ryan Loy, Assistant Professor and Extension Agricultural Economist
Agricultural Economics and Agribusiness
rloy@uada.edu
Transcript
00;00;07;16 – 00;00;09;14
Riley Smith
Right. Yeah, it was my uncle.
00;00;09;18 – 00;00;11;05
Dr. Ryan Loy
Oh, well, there you go. Speak of the devil.
00;00;11;12 – 00;00;13;28
Riley Smith
Yeah. It was not a good message, though.
00;00;14;00 – 00;00;14;23
Dr. Ryan Loy
Oh,
00;00;14;25 – 00;00;30;03
Riley Smith
I’m corning all his spots while he’s currently gone in New Mexico. Elk Hunting I’ll just. And I can’t see his picture. He’s got cell cams, but I. One of the deals about hunting big Deer is you stay out of there. So. Oh, yeah. I corned them Saturday and he told me about Thursday.
00;00;30;03 – 00;00;33;21
Riley Smith
I’d probably have to corn them again. Well, he just sent me a text saying they’re out of corn. And so.
00;00;33;27 – 00;00;35;15
Dr. Ryan Loy
Oh, boy. They’re hungry.
00;00;35;15 – 00;00;44;18
Riley Smith
I’m like, crud. And I’m so like, I wish I could go do it today, but we have a time slot where we like to do it. We like to do it around lunch. So it’s going to be tomorrow before they.
00;00;44;19 – 00;00;44;25
Riley Smith
Yeah.
00;00;44;25 – 00;00;47;19
Dr. Ryan Loy
Because you don’t want to get up in there when they start coming out again, right.
00;00;47;26 – 00;00;54;03
Riley Smith
Well you just try to get you basically you’re not trying to pattern deer. You’re trying to make deer pattern you. Yeah.
00;00;54;09 – 00;00;57;05
Dr. Ryan Loy
Yeah, that makes sense. That makes sense. It’s a good way to look at it.
00;00;57;08 – 00;01;01;02
Riley Smith
But any who. You ready?
00;01;01;04 – 00;01;01;21
Dr. Ryan Loy
I’m ready.
00;01;01;23 – 00;01;02;28
Dr. Ryan Loy
00;01;03;01 – 00;01;33;18
Riley Smith
Well. Good morning. Good morning. Welcome to another episode of Morning Coffee and AG Markets with your host, Riley Smith. Today I’ve got Dr. Ryan Loy in the studio with us. Hunter is currently in North Carolina giving a presentation, so we’ve got him in here today. We’ve got a pretty, pretty important topic this week. Rate Shift, The Fed’s bold 50 basis points cut and Doctor Ryan is going to be discussing about the federal funds rate and the update on it.
00;01;33;18 – 00;01;42;02
Riley Smith
So if you just want to get started by talking, giving us a briefing on what happened yesterday when they released it. And, we’ll start from there.
00;01;42;05 – 00;01;56;23
Dr. Ryan Loy
Well, Riley, you know that you mentioned this is a very important topic, and it really is. And this is something that, has been, you know, folks, you know, in the ag world and in the non ag world have been waiting for this for a long time. And so, you know, at the time of this recording it was yesterday.
00;01;56;23 – 00;02;22;09
Dr. Ryan Loy
But you know, last Wednesday the US Federal Reserve implemented a notable change during their September 2024 meeting of the Federal Open Market Committee. Well, the Federal Open Market Committee is just a federal arm that’s responsible for U.S. monetary policy so that the arm of the Federal Reserve that handles US monetary policy. And in their meeting yesterday, the FOMC, FOMC decided to reduce the federal funds rate by 50 basis points.
00;02;22;12 – 00;02;46;17
Dr. Ryan Loy
Now 50 basis points. This translates into a half a percentage point okay. So they reduce that rate by half a percentage point. Thus they lowered the target rate to basically four and 4.75% to 5%. And I would suspect that the fed fund, the effective federal funds rate will actually fall to about, oh, you know, 4.9, maybe a little bit lower than that is where it’ll be effective.
00;02;46;19 – 00;03;10;10
Dr. Ryan Loy
This is this this is a significant shift, though, as it as this rate has remained between 5.25% and 5.5%, with an effective rate of five and a third percent since July of 2023. Now what? All what does all this mean? We’ll get into that today. But this action really represents the most substantial rate cut by the fed outside of emergency measures such as those during the Covid 19 recession.
00;03;10;10 – 00;03;29;08
Dr. Ryan Loy
So we saw that during Covid 19. And this is the most substantial cut since the global financial crisis of 2008. So this is a big deal. This isn’t something that’s just a subheadline. This is a big deal. You know, the fed is being really aggressive on reducing these rates. Some market observers argue that this cut was was really overdue.
00;03;29;10 – 00;03;50;19
Dr. Ryan Loy
And they point to indicators such as the weak July 2024 employment report, which came in, you know, kind of under undervalued and really stocked that, the stock market tanked, the stock market. Oh. Early August is when it happened. And everybody will recall what I’m talking about. Everybody saw that. And, you know, that employment report really reflected a cooling labor market.
00;03;50;21 – 00;04;13;03
Dr. Ryan Loy
However, others, you know, other speculators caution that this cut may be too aggressive and could risk reigniting these inflationary pressures that the fed has been combating since 2002. The fed chair, Jerome Powell, yesterday emphasized that the rate decision was not a reactive measure but a proactive step in anticipation of economic conditions, with expectations for additional, smaller cuts through the end of 2024.
00;04;13;04 – 00;04;20;26
Dr. Ryan Loy
That’s very important, but this raises questions as to why the rate cut occurred now, rather than earlier in the year, and what implications that may have for farmers.
00;04;20;29 – 00;04;25;12
Riley Smith
Okay. So, why did they have the cut right now?
00;04;25;15 – 00;04;44;16
Dr. Ryan Loy
Yeah, absolutely. So, you know, the big thing about this is, as we previously mentioned in another episode of Morning Coffee and AG Markets, the federal funds rate is the cost of borrowing between banks overnight. Okay. So banks have deposit requirements and they must maintain those reserves. Or if they have excess reserves, they will loan that out to other banks.
00;04;44;16 – 00;05;06;25
Dr. Ryan Loy
So they’ll borrow from other banks. And that costs to borrow that money is the federal funds rate. So an increase in the federal funds rate raises the cost of these interbank loans, which subsequently raises the prime lending rate, which is the minimum, basically the the minimum cost of borrowing for individuals and businesses. Okay. And so the prime rate usually is about 3% higher than the fed funds rate.
00;05;07;02 – 00;05;28;15
Dr. Ryan Loy
So we were looking at about an 8% effective federal prime rate during this time. Since July 2023. And and that makes expensive borrowing very expensive borrowing. So the fed adjusts the federal funds rate to manage inflation and economic activity. But when these inflationary pressures arise, the fed raises the rate to make borrowing more expensive and promote slower economic growth.
00;05;28;15 – 00;05;45;25
Dr. Ryan Loy
They just need the economy to slow down a bit so we don’t get out of hand. And our inflation and our price instability kind of skyrockets. Conversely, during those periods of economic downturn, the fed lowers the rate to encourage borrowing and stimulate investment. Right. That makes sense, right? Let’s make let’s make borrowing cheaper. Let’s stimulate the economy. Let’s make investment better.
00;05;45;25 – 00;06;10;07
Dr. Ryan Loy
And let’s kind of let’s kind of get a little pep in our step. Essentially, this concept is designed to balance economic activity either by promoting growth through cheaper borrowing or by tempering the inflation through more costly credit, which is what we’ve seen since about Covid. But why did the fed decide to cut now? Well, one of the central objectives of the fed is to restore price stability without triggering a substantial increase in unemployment, something that we saw a lot.
00;06;10;07 – 00;06;32;11
Dr. Ryan Loy
And, you know, I wasn’t alive, but something that a lot of our listeners probably remember of the 1980s farm crisis. The fed at that time saw the inflationary pressures coming down, and the second they saw it coming down, they lowered the rates. Well, that reignited those inflationary pressures and threw us into two back to back recessions. Jerome Powell, the chair of the fed, the current chair of the fed, is very aware of what happened in the 80s.
00;06;32;14 – 00;06;52;05
Dr. Ryan Loy
And so that’s the reason why he’s kind of waited a long time to make sure that this data that’s coming in is true, and not just lagged behind or an outlier. So those are the things that he’s been looking at. So those central objectives is to make sure that, you know, we don’t have an increase in unemployment while making sure that price stability stays.
00;06;52;05 – 00;07;16;12
Dr. Ryan Loy
And Jerome Powell has expressed confidence in the current unemployment rate, which stands at a healthy 4.2%, a level that has remained relatively stable over time the last few months. During his press conference on Wednesday, Powell noted that mean that, quote, maintaining an unemployment rate in the low 4% range reflects a healthy labor market, which is something we’ve seen over the last few months.
00;07;16;15 – 00;07;34;14
Dr. Ryan Loy
So an increase in unemployment signals to the fed that the labor market is weakening, a potential consequence of maintaining these persistently high rates. So when they see that, they say, okay, these businesses are no longer having investment, they’re no longer expanding. They’re trying to they’re actually contracting. So we need to respond and lower these rates a little bit.
00;07;34;14 – 00;08;05;06
Dr. Ryan Loy
So that way we don’t get thrown into a global or an economic contraction ourselves. And without a rate reduction, you know, slowing the economy too sharply could lead to higher unemployment without actually achieving the desired stabilization and prices. Again, that’s exactly what happened in the 80s. This rate cut is intended to mitigate that risk. Additionally, the Federal Reserve’s preferred measure of inflation, the personal consumption expenditure of the PC, has been trending near the Fed’s target of 2% inflation over the past few months.
00;08;05;07 – 00;08;31;26
Dr. Ryan Loy
Now, what does that mean? Well, when the fed, or when you see in the news headlines that inflation is X amount percent, they’re referring to the PC. So that PC value, you know, has not consistently reached 2% yet, but new data and, you know, data that we’ve had over the last few months has indicated a gradual decline in inflation that provides the fed with increased confidence that inflation is stabilizing at that manageable level.
00;08;31;29 – 00;08;46;18
Dr. Ryan Loy
Recall that the primary objective of actually raising these, raising the federal funds rate, is to stabilize inflation down to the 2% target. And if inflation stays near this goal, the PC stays near this goal. The fed can continue to justify lowering those rates.
00;08;46;20 – 00;08;48;26
Riley Smith
So that was a whole lot of information.
00;08;48;26 – 00;08;52;26
Dr. Ryan Loy
That is a lot of information. But it’s a dense topic. It’s a very dense topic.
00;08;52;26 – 00;09;11;17
Riley Smith
So with that let’s kind of pick this thing apart just a little bit okay. So with this change in interest, this raise of the federal funds rate, what does that do for say, a producer slash grower. What does he need to know as far as this goes. What how is it affect him.
00;09;11;17 – 00;09;30;28
Dr. Ryan Loy
Absolutely. So again and there’s my absolutely again. But so for farmers, the important part for farmers to take away from all of this, you know, crazy stuff we’ve talked about today is that the federal funds rate directly influences the prime rate, which directly influences the rate that those farmers are paying on their operating notes, their short term debt.
00;09;31;00 – 00;09;53;07
Dr. Ryan Loy
Okay. So these lower interest rates actually may present a valuable opportunity for managing debt now. And there’s a few ways that you can really go about doing that. So, you know, given the ongoing challenges of of week 2024, commodity prices, which I know you’ll cover here in a little bit, and historically high input costs, the start of easing interest rates really offers that much needed reprieve to producers.
00;09;53;09 – 00;10;13;09
Dr. Ryan Loy
But it’s not the fact of you can just wake up tomorrow, and the interest on that loan you got last year is going to be better, but there are ways you can mitigate that. Producers may actually find those opportunities to refinance or consolidate their debt under more favorable terms. So, you know, refinancing is you take your loan and you refinance it under more favorable terms.
00;10;13;13 – 00;10;27;02
Dr. Ryan Loy
And while you may be paying it for a longer time because you’re also refinancing, but your monthly payments are now lower or your yearly payments are now lower, even if you’re paying it for a longer time, those incremental payments are smaller because that interest expense is much smaller.
00;10;27;09 – 00;10;34;04
Riley Smith
It’s just like you would on a on a how long loan on a house. It’s the difference between a 15 year loan versus a 30 year.
00;10;34;04 – 00;10;38;23
Dr. Ryan Loy
It’s exactly right. But you get better interest now because that rate has come down now. It hasn’t.
00;10;38;23 – 00;10;44;15
Riley Smith
Come down. Oh I misunderstood you. So it has come down. So we have gotten a lower interest rate.
00;10;44;15 – 00;10;46;11
Dr. Ryan Loy
So the interest rates have come down.
00;10;46;16 – 00;10;47;00
Riley Smith
Okay I’ll.
00;10;47;00 – 00;10;48;02
Dr. Ryan Loy
Go I’ll go through this.
00;10;48;02 – 00;10;52;00
Riley Smith
Again. There were so there was so much information to go through that I was trying to keep up.
00;10;52;00 – 00;10;55;09
Dr. Ryan Loy
But I’ll go through this again. So the fed funds rate is what they cut yesterday.
00;10;55;09 – 00;10;57;01
Riley Smith
Yeah okay. 50 basis points.
00;10;57;01 – 00;11;13;16
Dr. Ryan Loy
That directly influences the prime rate right. Which the prime rate sets the base for what a bank is going to loan to you okay. But they that’s really not what you’re going to get. You’re going to get probably a percentage point or two higher than that. So the prime rate for the last since July 2023 has sat at 8%, 8 to 3%.
00;11;13;19 – 00;11;33;05
Dr. Ryan Loy
So you’re getting something above that at minimum, right. They drop it, you know, a quarter percentage point or excuse me, a half a percentage point 50 basis points. The fed funds rate that cut that, the prime rate comes down with it. And subsequently your operating notes come down with it. But you have to refinance or get a new loan in order to actually get that interest, because you’re still going to be paying that interest.
00;11;33;05 – 00;11;35;06
Dr. Ryan Loy
You locked in it, right? Right, right. Does that make sense?
00;11;35;06 – 00;11;36;07
Riley Smith
Just like yes, that’s right.
00;11;36;07 – 00;11;52;23
Dr. Ryan Loy
But when you refinance you you kind of bundle it. You know, you refinance your loan, but you’re not. Let’s say you have, you know, let’s say you have six months left on that loan. Well, when you refinance, you probably end up having to pay it over 12 months, but your incremental payments are now much lower. And one thing you know Andrew.
00;11;52;23 – 00;12;14;05
Dr. Ryan Loy
Right. A colleague at Texas A&M, he recently published a really insightful article on southern and today which I will link in our newsletter that really explores these options in much more detail. And I really encourage, I urge all of our listeners to go and read that article. And again, I’ll link it in our newsletter. So that way everybody can look at it, because that is a topic that deserves its own podcast alone.
00;12;14;05 – 00;12;32;05
Dr. Ryan Loy
And I didn’t want to get it. You know, too much into the weeds of that, because this is already a very complicated, you know, topic of conversation. And so really just know you have few options. You have options now and there’s ways you can go about, you know, managing your debt in a much better, situation. And so those are really the biggest implications to take away for farmers.
00;12;32;08 – 00;12;38;05
Riley Smith
Gotcha. All right. So what do you what implications do you see for 2024 and 2025?
00;12;38;07 – 00;13;01;26
Dr. Ryan Loy
Well, this significant rate cut really does not mean the end of the Fed’s efforts. They’re not claiming victory yet. And they can’t they can’t preemptively claim victory. They need to make sure and be sure that inflation is going to stay at this level. And unemployment is staying in this healthy range. And so the fed will continue to monitor and analyze new data, just like they do every month, to ensure that inflation does not re accelerate in response to these lower rates.
00;13;01;26 – 00;13;09;05
Dr. Ryan Loy
Right. Because again, they raise the rate to bring inflation down. And if they cut it, there is a chance that inflation could reignite and come right back up.
00;13;09;05 – 00;13;14;03
Riley Smith
Ron I ain’t gonna lie I’m never saying I healthy on on unemployment.
00;13;14;05 – 00;13;38;03
Dr. Ryan Loy
Well it is kind of a misnomer right. It is a misnomer on a healthy unemployment level. That is not it is it is a misnomer. But what you mean by healthy unemployment level is that that is the level that our economy can stand still, can, can, can deal with and still grow and still be healthy. Right. You know, so when they’re in that range, they’ve seen over years of data that that range is the sweet spot okay.
00;13;38;03 – 00;13;54;25
Dr. Ryan Loy
Because not everybody’s going to work. Right. You know there’s going to be one reason or the other. But that’s that healthy amount. You don’t want it to skyrocket. Right. And then you have a lot of people laid off. You have a lot of people fired because of the economic situation. Right? Right. But what that 4% is telling you is that that economic situation is kind of in that sweet spot.
00;13;54;25 – 00;13;56;20
Dr. Ryan Loy
So you should probably start cutting it before that gets.
00;13;56;20 – 00;14;16;09
Riley Smith
What we’re seeing. The more we’re seeing the unemployment rate come down from 2020 2020 2021. Oh yeah. Absolutely. When there was a lot of people that were laid off, that’s a lot of people that went on unemployment that weren’t didn’t want to. But I understand what you’re saying. Yeah. So I just when I heard that I would I just got a chuckle out of it.
00;14;16;15 – 00;14;18;28
Riley Smith
I was like, I have never seen a healthy unemployment rate.
00;14;18;29 – 00;14;51;12
Dr. Ryan Loy
No, no, healthy is is a misnomer. It’s healthy for the economy. Right. And so current market expectations suggest that the fed will continue to gradually reduce rates, potentially reaching a target rate of 4% to 4.25% by the end of 2024. Now, this would imply cuts of 25 basis points or quarter percentage point 25 basis points equals a quarter percentage point per meeting, with three year meeting of three meetings remaining in 2024 and additional reductions anticipated for 2025.
00;14;51;14 – 00;14;52;15
Riley Smith
Will that be nice?
00;14;52;15 – 00;15;11;00
Dr. Ryan Loy
It would be nice, but don’t hold your breath because it’s very unlikely that interest rates will ever return in the near future to pre-COVID-19 levels, as fed policymakers have come out several times and indicated that the fed funds rate below 2% like we had before Covid is just not in the cards.
00;15;11;03 – 00;15;19;11
Riley Smith
Was never going to be because it’s just like the price of everything like that. We want the price of everything to come back down to where it was pre-COVID. That’s right.
00;15;19;13 – 00;15;20;13
Dr. Ryan Loy
It’s won’t happen.
00;15;20;13 – 00;15;41;27
Riley Smith
It’ll come back down, it’ll level bear itself back out, it’ll balance, but it won’t come back down because everything has has sustained itself in this market. It will come back down lower, but we won’t ever see it as low in the near future. We want to ever see it as low as it was, just because more money’s been printed in the value of what?
00;15;41;27 – 00;16;06;24
Riley Smith
The monetary value of what a dollar is now and and as we know, the, minimum wage will steadily keep increasing, of course, over time. And so the price, the, the prices, the interest rate, I don’t know, I don’t think in my lifetime I’m 25 fixing to be 26 years. I don’t I don’t think in my lifetime I’ll ever see it below 5% again.
00;16;06;24 – 00;16;24;19
Dr. Ryan Loy
Probably you’ll see it below 5% at least the fed funds rate. Now the interest on your operating loan probably not. But yield the fed funds rate. Well at least it will come down. It won’t. It won’t see that sub 2% though. So think about the prime rate okay. So the prime rate when the fed funds rate is zero is 3% right.
00;16;24;19 – 00;16;31;15
Dr. Ryan Loy
So that’s their minimum right. But if it’s at 2% the prime rate is probably going to be about 5% right now.
00;16;31;15 – 00;16;34;19
Riley Smith
Just just imagine 1970 19.
00;16;34;19 – 00;16;38;06
Dr. Ryan Loy
80 oh I don’t want to imagine if they had they had like 16%.
00;16;38;06 – 00;16;48;19
Riley Smith
Interest well before 80, before 80 they didn’t before 80, they had it was like my dad remembers when it was, I think like 1.5%, 2%.
00;16;48;22 – 00;16;50;06
Dr. Ryan Loy
Which we had pre-COVID.
00;16;50;09 – 00;16;53;07
Riley Smith
That’s cheap. It’s money, cheap money.
00;16;53;09 – 00;16;54;02
Dr. Ryan Loy
It’s cheap money.
00;16;54;02 – 00;16;59;19
Riley Smith
And then like, well, 1980 banking interest. It was 21%. Yep.
00;16;59;22 – 00;17;02;26
Dr. Ryan Loy
Yep. It’s it’s insane. It’s insane. You know.
00;17;02;26 – 00;17;17;02
Riley Smith
And every every farmer listening to this like and listen around my age people that are and I’m not trying to call you old but people that are above my diet or, you know, around my dad’s age, right above you, above your 40s. I will say.
00;17;17;03 – 00;17;17;17
Dr. Ryan Loy
Remember.
00;17;17;24 – 00;17;20;06
Riley Smith
Though, remember 1980. That’s right. It was yesterday.
00;17;20;07 – 00;17;33;25
Dr. Ryan Loy
That’s right, that’s right. And that’s something that again, Jerome Powell, the chairman of the fed, the man who who makes the final say for these things, he’s very aware of that and has come out several times and said, we don’t want to do that again. Right.
00;17;33;28 – 00;17;39;05
Riley Smith
Well, that was very and that was a lot of him. I know that’s not all that’s informative. It’s it’s.
00;17;39;05 – 00;17;54;16
Dr. Ryan Loy
A lot to chew on. And this is, this is especially a case of a podcast where I really encourage the readers to go or listeners to go and read the newsletter, because I think that it would shed a lot more light than me just up here speaking about it. You can reread it a few times and kind of understand it.
00;17;54;16 – 00;17;59;23
Dr. Ryan Loy
And of course, if you have any questions, you’re welcome to reach out to me anytime and I’d be happy to take them and answer them.
00;17;59;26 – 00;18;16;21
Riley Smith
Well, you heard it straight from the horse’s mouth. Y’all go read it. Reach out Ryan and, he’ll be happy to answer any kind of questions that you have. But if we don’t have anything else. If you don’t have anything else. All right, guys, well, thanks again for joining another episode of Morning Coffee and AG Markets. You all stay tuned to my market report.
00;18;16;21 – 00;18;40;23
Riley Smith
Thanks. All right. You guys back with your market report. So we did have a little update change to the market report. So if we’re up to the near by futures. So corn is now December contract your Rice is now November contract. So for December 24 corn current price is at $4 and $4.13 per bushel. A month ago, price was at $4 per bushel.
00;18;40;23 – 00;19;05;12
Riley Smith
That’s up $0.13. Finally. Glad to see it up above $4. Would like to see it at five, but we’ll, keep rocking and rolling and see see what happens the rest of the season. Year ago, prices at $4.76 per bushel. That’s down 60 or that’s down $0.63 at current price. November 24. Rice is at $15.47 per cwt.
00;19;05;12 – 00;19;36;12
Riley Smith
Month agos price is at $14.98 per cwt. That’s up $0.49. a year agos price was at $16.03 per cwt. That’s down $0.56. November 24. Soybeans $10.14 per bushel. Month ago. Price was at $9.76 per bushel. That’s up $0.38 a year ago. Price was at $13.16 per bushel. That’s down $3.02 July 25 Wheat is at $6.12 per bushel.
00;19;36;12 – 00;20;07;04
Riley Smith
Month goes price was at $5.90 per bushel. That’s up $0.22 a year agos price was at $6.36 per bushel. That’s down $0.24 December 24. Cotton current price is at 70 $0.71 per pound. Month ago, price was at $0.69 per pound. That’s up $0.03. A year ago price was $0.88 per pound. That’s down $0.16 in your weekly U.S average for peanuts is $548 per ton at current price.
00;20;07;04 – 00;20;38;12
Riley Smith
A month ago was $524 per ton. That’s up $24 a year ago. Price was at $576 per ton. That’s down $28. That’s your current futures market report for your commodities. This week’s fertilizer prices Urea is at $480 per ton UAN 32-0-0 is at $400 per ton. DAP is at $812 per ton, potash is at $473.50 per ton, and your ag lime at $55 per ton.
00;20;38;15 – 00;21;03;14
Riley Smith
Now, I know that we normally do on the input prices. We do diesel. We’re currently taking that out of the podcast and the newsletter for the time being, trying to get a, what’s the word. A better reflection of the market that you guys are receiving in the field. Because as we looked at the numbers, it was not reflecting what a lot of producers were buying their, off road diesel for.
00;21;03;14 – 00;21;28;00
Riley Smith
So y’all stay with us, here soon, we’re hoping to have a better, accurate, measure of that. So with that being said, the Mississippi River level at Memphis, Tennessee, current levels at -6.8ft a year ago was at -10.23ft. So that’s your market report for this week. We thank you guys for joining another episode of Morning Coffee and AG Markets.
00;21;28;00 – 00;21;33;19
Riley Smith
We hope you enjoyed your morning coffee. Stay tuned for the next episode and we’ll catch y’all on the flip flop. Bye bye now.
About the Division of Agriculture
The University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture’s mission is to strengthen agriculture, communities, and families by connecting trusted research to the adoption of best practices. Through the Agricultural Experiment Station and the Cooperative Extension Service, the Division of Agriculture conducts research and extension work within the nation’s historic land grant education system.
The Division of Agriculture is one of 20 entities within the University of Arkansas System. It has offices in all 75 counties in Arkansas and faculty on five system campuses.
The University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture offers all its Extension and Research programs and services without regard to race, color, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, national origin, religion, age, disability, marital or veteran status, genetic information, or any other legally protected status, and is an Affirmative Action/Equal Opportunity Employer.
About the Dale Bumpers College of Agricultural, Food and Life Sciences
Bumpers College provides life-changing opportunities to position and prepares graduates who will be leaders in the businesses associated with foods, family, the environment, agriculture, sustainability and human quality of life; and who will be first-choice candidates of employers looking for leaders, innovators, policymakers and entrepreneurs. The college is named for Dale Bumpers, former Arkansas governor and longtime U.S. senator who made the state prominent in national and international agriculture. For more information about Bumpers College, visit our website, and follow us on Twitter at @BumpersCollege and Instagram at BumpersCollege.
Media Contact
Mary Hightower
U of A System Division of Agriculture
(501) 671-2006 | mhightower@uada.edu