Headlines:
- Donald Trump is the president elect, with the 45th presidential inauguration taking place on January 20th
- South American crop consultancy, CONAB, will release updated production estimates on Thursday, November 10th
- What Donald Trump’s election victory means for agriculture
A president who gained power with the motto “drain the swamp” might appear a boom for agriculture. But whether he turns out that way will require a more measured tone by Donald Trump when in office than that he voiced to win power. Sure, farmers may well enjoy something of a honeymoon for now from his victory, which is likely to take the dollar on a weaker course, for now, than it would have done had Mr Trump’s Democrat rival, Hillary Clinton, won the vote. The greenback fell 2% at one point overnight (although that decline had retreated to 0.5% long before breakfast time in New York). A weaker dollar improves the competitiveness of US exports – which are a big deal in agriculture, estimated by Washington at $127.0bn in the year to the end of September, and seen rising to $133.0bn in the current financial year, ahead of imports at $114.2bn.
Summary:
The supply is apparently unending. According to the USDA report today, Corn and Soybean yields and ending stocks are on the rise. The market response today was large losses across the grains. March Corn settled 12.50 (3.45%) below yesterday’s close. March Soybean Futures were down 18.25 (1.79%) and March Wheat lost 7.25 (1.68%).
The US Presidential election came down to the wire with some key swing states playing a major role in a victory for Donald J. Trump. The race was so tight that the networks were not comfortable making a call until about 2:30am Eastern Time. In the final hours, the Clinton campaign was holding out hope that momentum might turn in Hillary’s favor. Hillary did not concede and instead sent out Podesta, her campaign manager, to send her crowd home in hopes that when more votes were accounted for the outcome would change. Shortly after Podesta sent the HRC crowd home, Trump made his way to the stage and announced that Hillary had called him and conceded, then proceeded to give his acceptance speech.
The countdown to the final results of the election was not without drama. As the results were rolling in and began to show that Trump may in fact win, the knee-jerk reaction of the US markets and the global markets was to sell off. In fact the S&P futures was limit down in overnight trading. Crude, US Equities and International markets were all down similar to the Brexit responses a few months back. By the time the dust settled the Oil and Equity markets recovered and finished in positive territory. The grains on the other hand fell, then fell even harder post the WASDE report.
