The Trump Administration has dubiously used trade balances as a metric for measuring relative policy fairness but France’s digital tax and the proposed retaliation against it by Washington highlights differences in the composition of trade. Although the U.S. committed to negotiate with Europe on a singular OECD approach to digital enterprise taxes, no one expects a resolution before the two sides meet in Davos later this month. Instead, more retaliatory duties will be imposed on French goods - targeting champagne, cheese and other higher priced foods. The duties will have an outsized impact because of the composition of bilateral transatlantic trade. Ninety percent of Europe’s food exports to the U.S. are intermediate and...
Key Market Insights The broad market is locked in on this week’s Trump-Xi meeting in Beijing, but this is no longer just a trade summit. Increasingly, the meeting is becoming tied directly to Iran, energy security, and the growing global economic fallout from disruptions through the Strai...
From WPI Consulting
Forecasting developments in production agriculture
On behalf of a private U.S. agricultural technology provider, WPI’s team generated an econometric model to forecast the movement of concentrated corn production north and west from the traditional U.S. Corn Belt. WPI’s model has subsequently provided quantitative support to a multi-million-dollar investment into short-season corn variety development. WPI’s methodology included a series of interviews with regional grain elevators and seed consultants. Emphasizing outreach and communication with stakeholders who possess intimate sectoral knowledge – on-the-ground insights – is a regular component of WPI’s methodologies, made possible by WPI’s ever-growing network of industry contacts.