Katie Geerdes

For some reason, many seem to think that winning a trade war with China will be easy. After all, Treasury Secretary Bessent says that Beijing is holding a pair of twos. There is also the old adage that if you do not know who the patsy is in a poker game, don’t be surprised if it turns out to be you. Secretary Bessent says that we do not intend to decouple from China. Fine…but what if China intends to decouple from us? There are some very smart people who have great experience in China who believe that Xi has been preparing his country and the Chinese economy for Liberation Day, April 2nd, 2025 for years. When China sells us something, they are paid in dollars. Up until a few years ago, they would invest those dollars back into the US, favoring buying Treasury Bonds. Over the course of decades, they had bought US Bonds with peak holdings of $1.3 trillion in 2013. They have been receiving more dollars as their trade deficit with the US grew, yet were investing fewer of those dollars back into the US. Chinese owned US Treasuries have declined to $760 bln and they are not adding…

Farmers got out ahead of the rain last week getting a good start to the season, planting nearly 20% of Iowa already. Going forward it appears we will be fighting scattered showers for the next week or more. Above average temperatures appear to be on our side which will help dry out wet fields and reduce any risk of potential frost. It would appear the greater part of the Corn Belt will receive an additional 1" to 2" in the next week. Looking out ahead into early May, regions that have seen heavy showers up until now, lean drier such as Central Missouri and much of the Eastern Corn belt. This will be mostly positive as it will allow field work to continue. I am hoping for my crops to get planted this week, but it will all depend on how much rain we get.   Major weather threats are absent for Brazil's Safrinha corn crop. We continue to see 1" to 3" of rainfall for most of Brazil's second crop corn production area through the end of the month. The SW region of Goías leans drier but could still see some scattered showers. Extreme climate seems to linger in…

I have found that when a Navy Seal tells me something that I can take it to the bank. 30-year veteran Navy Seal Jason Gardner, now leadership instructor with the Echelon Front, spoke at our first Family Farm Masterclass in 2022. I had breakfast with him and we discussed Afghanistan and Ukraine. There was debate at the time as to whether Putin was truly planning to invade Ukraine. Our intelligence agencies were warning that the invasion was being prepared but not even all of Ukraine's leadership in Kyiv was convinced that it would actually happen. There were many skeptics who argued that Putin would not invade as it did not make sense. What mattered was that it made sense in Putin's head. I asked Jason for his opinion. He said that he had contacts in the teams who were in Poland and they had told Gardner that the invasion was imminent. I believed him. I also acted on the advice. We bought wheat calls that turned out to be the most profitable call options that we had ever purchased in my life as a result of this chain of information. We shared that info with subscribers. It comes down to…

"Thank you for all the kind comments on the 40th Anniversary CommStock Report aired Good Friday" Hope that you had a pleasant Easter!   Let's catch up on the market outlook:   So far, the weakness seen from the equity market highs, while having achieved the textbook definition of being a bear market correction, is relatively minor. I trade the e-mini-S&P. Weakness seen thus far is not enough to correct a 16-year bull market. The initial decline was arrested at the first level of significant support at a 50% retracement of the final leg up. It is extremely unlikely that this weakness is over yet and we do not know how big that it will get. If and when that low is broken, then the bear market is likely to become expansive with an extended duration to it. There is potential for this bear market to have a great scale of significance. There is real risk that it can mark the beginning of the undoing of American exceptionalism.   A 38% retracement of the 16-year bull market sets a downside target of 2635. That is just one possibility of many from the opening of Pandora's Box. I decided to buy…

I was a bit surprised to see Ray Dalio as one of the quests on "Meet the Press" Sunday April 13th. I follow Dalio and he has been issuing some warnings over financial markets that I was not sure that they would air on national TV. They did. He did not hold back. He is not worried about a garden variety recession. Dalio has been in the industry for about 50 years and is a student of history. He forecasts, "The times ahead will be radically different from those we've experienced in our lifetimes, though similar to many times in history." Did you understand what he meant?  He sees current developing events as more similar to the 1930's. The following is a summary of his interview on "Meet the Press". Here is a construct of the interview: "Ray Dalio, the founder of Bridgewater Associates, delves into the critical themes of his upcoming book, "How Countries Go Broke," offering a sobering analysis of the prevailing global economic and political climate. He posits that the current tariff disputes are not isolated incidents but rather manifestations of deeper, more systemic issues rooted in five fundamental historical forces that have consistently shaped global trajectories.…

On the Grains Be cautious of Monday’s planting report on relatively light news while we finish the week. I have clients in western Iowa who are done with corn. Yes, you read that correctly. While exceptionally early, the dry conditions are too good for many to slow down. I was skeptical of the 95.3 million corn acres that the USDA released at the end of March, yet as early as the Midwest is rolling, it sure is possible now. If you switch acres from beans to corn, remember you get longer December 25 contracts. Look at managing that risk before the June 30th acres report, and possibly before the Memorial Day weekend, as this thing will be wrapped up in no time. The Buenos Aires Grain Exchange estimated its 2025/26 crop at 20.5 MMT, the second largest on record and 10.2% higher than last year’s troubled corn crop. This content is for members only.Register Already a member? Log in here

Planters are rolling this week as temperatures have allowed soil temps to warm up to 50 degrees Fahrenheit for most of the state of Iowa. I am looking to get my crops planted in the next ten days. Heavy rainfall will cover Texas, Oklahoma and Missouri with up to 5" in some areas this week. Scattered showers will bring 1" – 2" to much of Iowa, Illinois, Wisconsin and Michigan. Nebraska and the Dakotas look to get a big old goose egg, with virtually no precipitation scheduled for this week. Global corn stocks remain extremely low and are becoming increasingly dependent on the US growing season to keep the world fed.   Brazil's Center west region continues to see adequate rainfall through the end of April. Most areas will receive up to 4" this week. RGDS has yet again turned dry but as they are over halfway through harvest, it may not make much difference at this point. We received soybean yield reports in RGDS as low as 8bpa. Meanwhile we have heard yield reports in the North as "far exceeding their expectations". Good yields should at least partially make up for the bad.   This is more or less…

The Yale Budget Lab put out their numbers for how much the tariffs would cost an American household at the tariff rates that existed last Friday to be $4700. They also explain that the cost will not be that high because high tariffs will destroy demand and consumers will find alternatives or go without. They do not have $4700. This would be crazy inflation prompting the Fed to increase rather than reduce interest rates. China did not respond to the last US tariff rate hike to 145%, calling the tariff rate escalation a "joke". What they meant by that is that after tariffs get so high, orders are canceled and business collapses. Beijing put out a White Paper which stated that by their estimation that when the tariff rate bests 54%, it becomes irrelevant as the exchange of business stops.   The Chinese White Paper asserted: "With tariffs at 54%, most models – including our own – have exports to the U.S. falling almost to zero," they said in a research note. They calculated the total damage from the 2025 tariffs to be roughly 2.2 percentage points off in GDP. A large hit but one that Beijing is capable of offsetting. Rory Green,…

Tales as Old as Time   Morning Market Talk Below, you will find today's installment of Moring Market Talk.   Cash Cattle/Soybean Technicals   You can copy and paste the link below for this morning's episode.   https://youtu.be/MSG9P89b41M?si=t3CvnBQ-d4jWD7h6   On the Grains   One thing is for sure: history repeats itself. It is just a matter of when that happens that keeps the market guessing. For example, I am certain there were times when my grandpa looked at what my dad was doing shook his head, and said it would never work. Likewise, I am positive my dad has watched me attempt tasks I thought I had a better way of doing, shook his head, and said, "That will never work." This is as old as time itself. I would guarantee that in the caveman era, a father was watching his son trying to make fire a new way that he learned from another tribe and said that would never work We will freeze to death, probably followed by "damn kid can't be mine." While most likely dressed similar to Fred Flintstone. My point is that the market will react until proven correct or incorrect, and staying rational will be…

For some time, I have explained to subscribers, warning in my uncompleted series, "Out of Time", that at some point the debt bubble would get so big that supply would exceed demand. Fed Chairman Jerome Powell recently said, "Our debt is manageable but the trajectory of US debt is not."   That was pre-trade war. On the current trajectory, they will need to sell more bonds than the market can absorb. The result would be higher interest rates, when a weakening economy would otherwise lower them.  There were signs in the bond and currency markets that this worrisome inflection point may be getting reached. There was worry about a recession and global growth slowing and instead of interest rates falling and bonds serving as a safe haven in the turmoil occurring, 10-year Treasury rates rose over half a point last week.  Debt supply continues to grow. One source of influence was the tariffs, which are the biggest tax increase in history. Another source is the prospect of declining revenue from a recession. Trump says that other countries pay the tariffs. He should tell that to the business woman who canceled her order in China because she could not come up…