Loading ...Because, over the last century, food has become worthless. ‘Improvements’ in so many areas have resulted in cheap, low nutrition foods, dead soil, over-leveraged farmers and consumers addicted to stuff; and cheap food. Food used to be a third of the household budget. Now it’s an eighth, or a tenth. After air and water, which are both free, our fundamental building block is insignificant in our budget, which means that the farmers aren’t getting the necessary price. We need to start valuing our food. Paying what is required for a stable supply of nutritious meals.
UBS – here you go
Higher prices quashing demand.
Silver outlook cut as supply deficit seen shrinking in 2026, UBS says
Next crisis will be bushels.
I can’t copy it all. Sulfuric acid imports are being banned in Asia. Food crisis could be global according the their research.
Year-to-date, wheat is up roughly 30%. The breakout on the chart is the kind of base breakout any seasoned commodity trader would recognize as the start of a major move.
Because of an early heat dome across Kansas, Oklahoma, and the Texas panhandle, 34% of the winter wheat crop is already forming grain heads. This means that the crop is maturing two to three weeks early. Wheat plants that “head out” early produce smaller kernels, less starch, lower test weights, and dramatically lower yields per acre. But that’s not the real problem. The real problem is that American farmers planted the smallest wheat acreage since 1919.
Not since World War I, not since cars began to outnumber horses, has the United States, the world’s breadbasket, planted this little wheat. We are growing the smallest crop in 107 years, on the worst-rated acreage in a decade, in the middle of a Plains drought.
U.S. farmers didn’t plant less wheat because they wanted to. They planted less wheat because they couldn’t afford to plant it. The total cost per acre (seed, DAP, diesel, crop insurance premiums, equipment, labor, repairs, hauling, storage) to grow a wheat crop is roughly $685. The breakeven price for wheat, on a typical 45-bushel-per-acre Kansas yield, is therefore $15.20 a bushel. But wheat closed Wednesday at $6.58.
The American wheat farmer has been losing money on every acre for three straight years, even with crop-insurance subsidies and disaster payments propping up the income statement. Now the bank loans are coming due, the land is being foreclosed, and the equipment is being repossessed. U.S. farm bankruptcies are up 46% year-over-year (“YOY”), the steepest jump since the 2008-2010 collapse and the second-steepest in 40 years. Chapter 12 filings – the bankruptcy code provision specifically designed for family farmers – accelerated again in Q1 2026. Every farm that goes under takes acreage off the board. Sometimes permanently. Because the consolidation buyers are corporate operators who plant corn and soybeans (more profitable, easier to mechanize) instead of wheat.
This is how a supply shock builds. Not in a single bad-weather event. But in a multi-year squeeze where the marginal producer is wiped out one season at a time, until the only ones left can charge whatever the market will bear.
As supplies of food and other commodities tighten, prices will rise – far more than anyone expects. The U.S. Producer Price Index (“PPI”) is up 6% YOY already. Those increases will filter into consumer prices over the next 90 days, and they will keep rising. We’re facing the kind of inflationary shock we haven’t seen since the 1970s with a bond market that’s still pricing in inflation rates below 3% for the next decade.
War isn’t good for bonds. And there’s an entire generation of Americans who haven’t ever seen anything like what’s about to happen to the fixed-income markets. If the Gulf remains closed through the end of June, I think we’ll see 10-year yields above 6% – and rising. That’s not on anyone’s bond-market bingo card today.
In 2022, the bond market experienced a 237-basis point rise in 10-year yields as the massive COVID inflation was priced into the bond market. That produced a 13% loss in the investment-grade fixed-income markets (Bloomberg U.S. Aggregate Fixed Income Index). That was the worst year in the history (1976) of the index and wiped out $3.4 trillion in capital. That index doesn’t include high-yield bonds or muni bonds. If you include the losses in that part of the bond market, the total losses exceeded $4 trillion.
But as you probably know, there’s been a massive debt issuance boom. The bond market is now much larger than it was in 2022. Today a 150-basis point move higher in the 10-year Treasury yield (from 4.5% to 6.0%) would see losses of around $3 trillion in Treasuries, over $1 trillion in agency mortgage bonds, and over $1.2 trillion in investment-grade corporate bonds… plus another $1 trillion in everything else… for around $7 trillion in losses.
Long-term rates over 6% would push margin rates at brokerage firms to 10% or more. How much of the $1.3 trillion in margin debt would remain outstanding at those rates? Not much.
We’re heading into a huge crisis for the world and for our bond markets with a government that doesn’t seem to want an off ramp. Meanwhile, the stock market is trading at all-time, peak bubble levels. This is, without a doubt, the worst risk-to-reward set up I have ever seen in the stock market across my entire 30-year career. If there’s a happy ending here for investors, it will be a miracle.
How to hedge against these risks? Own the businesses that can convert cheap American energy into everything the world is now short.
Riding high in April
Shot down in May.
Ipso
Ha then your good, no worries They should be defunded. Only check that goes out goes to mothers and their children for food or medical needs worldwide.
Can you spell bloodbath?
Today … not our best day.
goldielocks @ 15:18
I’ll wait for you to send your check in to the UN first. 🙂
Maddog
When I went to edit A couple of words in my last post it said it closed the connection.
Right on those weapons. Any one who signs up for attacking one of our ships is on a suicide mission.
Ipso 13:24
UN who doesn’t do anything for maintaining peace or the civil rights of sovereign nations or any group or anything else it’s meant to do not scamming for money with leftist propaganda while people are being genocides and colonized by muslims including in Europe and they’re all for it.
But send your check to their address in NYC so they can push more of their leftist agenda anti Christian propaganda. They’re running out of money as scams get exposed.
Send it to their office in New York.
The United Nations (UN) headquarters is located in New York City, USA. The complex sits on an 18-acre site in the Turtle Bay neighborhood of Midtown Manhattan, bordering the East River to the east, First Avenue to the west, East 42nd Street to the south, and East 48th Street to the north.
Key Details About the Site:
- Address: 405 East 42nd Street, New York, NY 10017, USA.
- International Territory: The land is considered international territory and belongs to the 193 UN Member States.
- Main Structures: The complex, completed in 1952, includes the Secretariat building, the General Assembly building, the Conference Building, and the Dag Hammarskjöld Library.
- Visitor Access: Guided tours are available to the
Not sure u need inside info to have a punt on an escalation, if u saw this.
Deadlocked At Square Zero: Very First Line Of Iran’s Latest Proposal ‘Unacceptable,’ Trump Says
Maddog
It’s the UN loonies! Looking forward to their skim!
They’re starting out asking for trillions but will settle for billions.
ipso facto
Whoever did the Maths at the UN, wasn’t top of the class…if the US owes $ 26 Trillion, how come Portugal is $ 20 Trillion, or the UK $ 24 Trillion…..
and I wonder which account the monies are supposed to paid into…..António Guterres of Portuga
Why are we still a member?
Peter St Onge, Ph.D.
@profstonge
The UN wants $131 trillion in “reparations” for colonialism.
Including $26 trillion from the US.
The kicker is colonialism was the best thing that ever happened to the Third World.
deer79
“algos” Yes that seems to be the case. Too bad … we sorta had em runnin for the hills a while back.
Ipso
very informative site. Looks like the premiums have been pretty consistent since this past February or so…..
The algo’s will continue to do what they want…..
Made a few dollars …
Americas Gold and Silver Reports Record Production and Sales in Q1 2026 as Execution on the Growth Plan Continues at Galena
Roll the cue
…..won’t be long before the financial media comes out with…..”Gold and Silver are being sold to raise cash because they’re so liquid.”
Working Group on Financial markets will be working overtime….
Crimex sees buying to begin with…..after a major fall….someone likes it
and then the selling starts