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The Trump administration opted not to renew a trade agreement with Mexico and Canada, kicking off a decade-long review process that will require yearly talks. “The United States did not agree to renew the USMCA in its current form,” U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said on Wednesday, the deadline for implementing a 16-year extension favored by Canada and Mexico. The stakes are particularly high for corn growers, given the role both trade partners play in demand.
- “USMCA is the single most important trade agreement to the corn industry, with Mexico serving as the largest purchaser of corn and Canada serving as our largest ethanol market,” said Jed Bower, president of the National Corn Growers Association, in a statement. “Additionally, the dispute settlement mechanism in the agreement has been critical for corn growers challenging harmful policies impacting biotechnology access.”
Greer said the U.S. “will continue to engage with Mexico and Canada to address the Agreement’s shortcomings and our trade deficits with these countries.” President Donald Trump has made clear he’s not a fan of the USMCA and had publicly speculated about potentially scrapping it outright.
The U.S. declined to extend its signature trade pact with Mexico and Canada on Wednesday, setting up a decadelong review process that casts uncertainty over businesses that move goods across the world’s busiest export borders. The administration has previously imposed tariffs on a variety of goods covered under the agreement, effectively voiding parts of the pact.
The agreement remains in force until issues are resolved or the deal is terminated, Greer noted. The U.S. and Mexico will proceed later this month with a third round of bilateral talks tied to a joint review of the agreement.
Still crushing it: USDA’s monthly Oilseed Crushings report showed May soy crush hit 213.1 million bushels, a record for the month that also marked 15 consecutive such monthly records. Soyoil stocks came in at 2.315 billion bushels, the lowest in six months. Meal use was down. Corn for ethanol use totaled 471.8 million bushels, a record for the month and the most since December 2025.
Fertilizer ‘fast track’: USDA Secretary Brooke Rollins said Wednesday that the department will invest $500 million in new and existing fertilizer facilities in order to speed increased production in America. “We want fertilizer plants built in America and we are willing to prioritize it,” Rollins said. “By opening up the market, obviously those prices will come down for our farmers.” Bloomberg noted that two of the three main fertilizer types – phosphate and potash – are mined, with the U.S. holding limited reserves. The U.S. imports almost all of its potash, largely from Canada.
Earlier this week, Trump suspended duties on imports of phosphate fertilizers from Morocco, which USDA estimated could drop prices by 22%.
Lending data may signal caution toward crop sector: Farm-loan growth remained strong in the first quarter of 2026, but with a noteworthy shift, wrote Ty Kreitman, an associate economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, in a report published Wednesday. Outstanding farm debt continues to expand steadily at specialized agricultural banks, he noted, but non-real estate production loans fell at a small number of non-ag banks with agricultural portfolios of more than $1 billion.
Kreitman wrote:
- Farm loan delinquency rates were nearly unchanged from a year ago and remained relatively low, though loan performance has been weaker at large lenders in recent years. Aggregate farm financial conditions have remained resilient with support from government payments, strong cattle revenues and stable farm real estate values. However, the decline in production loans at a few large banks likely reflects caution toward ongoing crop sector challenges by some creditors and a growing concentration of lenders with specialization in agriculture.
The economists noted that farm production debt among large banks declined as delinquency rates among those lenders remained somewhat higher. Similar to the same time last year, about 2% of farm loans at the largest agricultural banks were past due at least 30 days and that share was less than 1.5% for all other size cohorts. “While delinquency rates remained relatively low overall, large lenders have maintained a problem loan rate higher than banks of other sizes for the past two decades and some may have limited growth in agricultural lending in response to ongoing challenges with loan performance,” he said.
No hints from Fed’s Warsh: Federal Reserve Chairman Kevin Warsh said Wednesday that inflation risks have come down over the past month, but wouldn’t opine on whether he expected a surge in price pressures from the Iran war to prove temporary. In a panel discussion at a central-banking forum in Sintra, Portugal, Warsh said, “I am not going to make a judgment now,” noting that the Fed meets again in four weeks.
Warsh has made clear he believes the Fed should communicate less in terms of its future policy moves, edging away from a policy known as “forward guidance.”
‘Beginning of the end’ for AI trade?: Michael Burry, who famously foresaw the 2007-2009 housing crisis and traded appropriately, is upping his bet that what he sees as an overhyped rally for artificial-intelligence plays is set to come undone. Burry announced short positions on Tesla, Caterpillar, semiconductor manufacturer Applied Materials and an ETF tracking chip makers, according to the Wall Street Journal. Burry said plans by South Korea’s Samsung and SK Hynix to invest over a half-trillion dollars in a chip hub triggered alarm bells.
- “The proximate cause of today’s rally is big spending announced out of Korea,” Burry wrote on Substack. “Well, I see that as the beginning of the end.”
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