Why Corn Prices Didn’t Crash With Other Commodities
Mexico’s exclusion from President Trump’s tariff blitz last week is propping up corn prices in what was otherwise carnage in the markets for raw materials.
Prices for fuels, precious metals, building materials and other cash crops, like soybeans and cotton, plunged as traders priced in the impact of hefty import taxes and unwound bets on global growth. But with no new tariffs on the biggest buyer of U.S. corn, futures ended the week slightly higher, at $4.60 a bushel.
Farmers have already begun shifting to corn over fears that the escalating trade war would tank soybean prices. During Trump’s previous term, China retaliated to his 2018 tariffs by buying far fewer U.S. soybeans, which it feeds to pigs, sending prices for America’s top cash crop tumbling 20%.
U.S. agricultural officials said last week before the tariff announcement that they expected farmers to plant one of their largest corn crops ever by shifting acres out of soybeans. The Agriculture Department is scheduled Monday to give an update on farmers’ planting progress and its monthly crops report is due Thursday.
Meanwhile, Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins said Sunday that the Trump administration is weighing financial aid to farmers. The federal government sent about $23 billion to compensate farmers during Trump’s first term.
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