Bunge Earnings Soar as War in Ukraine Boosts Grain Prices

Bunge Ltd., a crop trader and the world’s biggest oilseed processor, lifted its full-year earnings forecast while citing “unprecedented” conditions in global agricultural markets after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and a drought in Brazil boosted global crop prices.

Bunge is the “B” in the quartet of global crop merchants known as the ABCDs. Its rival and the “A” in the quartet, Archer-Daniels-Midland Co. reported its best-ever quarterly results Tuesday.

The war has created turmoil in corn, wheat and vegetable oil markets after shipments out of the Black Sea were halted and Ukraine’s plantings of corn and sunflowers crops were thrown into doubt. For Bunge and its peers, such large-scale disruption can bring once-in-a-generation opportunities to capitalize on their global networks of traders and export infrastructure.

Bunge said Wednesday that its own operations in Ukraine are back on track and the St. Louis-based company recorded an impairment of about $12 million from the war and damaged property and equipment. Still, “shipments from Ukraine are extremely limited on rail and trucks,” Chief Financial Officer John Neppl said on a conference call.

The company’s first-quarter earnings excluding one-time items rose to $4.26 a share from $3.13 a year earlier. The average of analysts’ estimates compiled by Bloomberg was $2.94. Shares rose 3.9% to $119.35 at 10:47 a.m. in New York.

Tags: Bunge, grain, price