A deadline for a congressional E15 taskforce to come up with a legislative proposal that would allow year-round use of the 15% ethanol blend came and went over the weekend without an announcement.
That’s probably not a surprise to anyone following the effort, but it did prompt a joint statement from farm and ethanol groups urging lawmakers to get moving.
“Year-round, nationwide E15 is an urgent priority for rural America, and it can’t wait. House leaders already have bipartisan, consensus legislation that has broad support from the overwhelming majority of biofuels, agriculture, fuel retail, and oil refining interests. The solution is on the table, and we urge council members to refocus their attention on proposals that already have widespread support,” the Renewable Fuels Association, Growth Energy and the National Corn Growers Association said in a joint statement.
- What’s the hold-up? “It appears that council members are running into opposition and resistance from the small group of mid-sized refiners who won’t accept anything other than the status quo,” Geoff Cooper, CEO of the Renewable Fuels Assocation, told Agri-Pulse.
It was opposition from small refiners, which divided House Republican lawmakers, that was seen quashing the language in funding legislation, which in turn enraged farm and ethanol groups. The language establishing the council called for legislation to be proposed by Feb. 15, with the aim of being considered by Feb. 25, but a standalone bill has always been seen as a much heavier lift.
In a speech in Iowa in late January, President Donald Trump said passage of year-round E15 legislation would happen, but put the onus on congressional Republican leaders. “We’ve got it for farmers, consumers and refiners, including small and midsize refiners. In other words, to get E15 approved, and they’re working on it, they’re very close to getting it done. I just wanted to let you know that,” he said.
Farm bill draws MAHA ire: Make America Healthy Again advocates are angry over a provision in the farm bill proposal unveiled late last week by House Agriculture Committee Chairman Glenn “GT” Thompson, R-Pennsylvania, that would bar states from requiring pesticide manufacturers to label packaging in ways that differ from EPA guidance, Politico reported.
MAHA advocates plan to lobby to have it removed from the Senate’s version of the farm bill and to double down on messaging around the midterm elections that would target supporters of the measure, the report said.
- “We plan to continue campaigning across social media and contacting representatives to either have the section stripped or amended,” Kelly Ryerson, a prominent MAHA influencer and co-executive director of American Regeneration, told Politico’s Morning Ag newsletter. “We will also be contacting [the] Senate to be sure they are aware of our sentiment.”
Still crushing it: The U.S. soybean crush last month hit a record for January, according to monthly data from the National Oilseed Processors Association (NOPA) released Tuesday. U.S. crush capacity has been on the rise as processors build new plants and expand existing ones in response to rising biofuels demand.
- NOPA members processed 221.564 million bushels of soybeans in January, up 10.6% from 200.83 mbu a year earlier. The total was down 1.5% from the 224.91 mbu crushed in December. It exceeded the average estimate of 218.52 million bushels produced by a Reuters survey of analysts.
Animal spirits: The BofA Global Research monthly fund manager survey for February released Tuesday shows investor risk appetite is running strong despite artificial-intelligence-induced volatility in stocks and wild swings in gold and silver. The survey found the combined allocation of fund managers to overweight positions in equities and commodities stood at a net 76%, the highest since January 2022.
- BofA analysts noted allocation to equities & commodities, a measure of demand for risky assets, has been correlated with the ISM manufacturing PMI. Lately, however, the two have diverged in a big way as manufacturing PMIs have lagged.
Meanwhile, fund managers are bearish on the dollar. The underweight position in the currency was more than 2.5 standard deviations below the mean, the survey found. A weaker dollar is seen as supportive for commodities priced in the currency, making them less expensive to users of other currencies.
- Watch out: But the dollar’s recent weakness combined with positioning carries a danger, warned Ole Hansen, head of commodity strategy at Saxo Bank, in a Tuesday note: “The dollar’s weakness in recent months has supported hard assets, but positioning has become increasingly one-sided. Bank of America’s latest FX sentiment survey shows fund managers holding their most bearish dollar stance in a decade. Such consensus does not guarantee a reversal, but it raises the risk of a counter-trend rebound.”
Check out this week’s Pro Farmer Podcast: Where will 2026 cotton acres go?