November, 2009
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Crop Insurance Competition – Is it Real?
Bruce Babcock, an economist at Iowa State University, recently prepared an extensive report on competition in the crop insurance industry. With all of this year’s crop delays in getting corn and beans harvested this fall, you may get to know your crop insurance agent better in the next couple of months. You are probably hoping […]
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What About 2010 Roth Conversions
The ROTH IRA has been around for many years. For many farmers and others that have income over $100,000 annually, they have either been unable to contribute to a ROTH IRA or convert a regular IRA to a ROTH IRA. Starting in 2010, these rules are changing for ROTH IRA’s. Here are 6 things that you […]
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Extension & Expansion of Homebuyer Credit
The Senate appears to be moving closer to passing a bill to extend and expand the homeowners credit to purchase a home. This credit was designed to help stimulate the housing market and I know in our area (which tends to have moderate to lower priced homes) that this credit is probably responsible for most […]
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Farmer as CFO
My friend Alex Tiller recently had a great post on how a farmer must be a good CFO in order to be a successful farmer in today’s complex financial world. As I quote him “Most ag producers are their own chief financial officer”. Most farmers are doing this job right now, but many of them do […]
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Warren Buys Burlington Northern
Growing up on our wheat farm in Walla Walla County in Washington state, we had a small railroad trestle that went over Dry Creek behind our house. The local train would come by in the morning headed to Dayton to pick up freight and then would head back to Walla Walla in the afternoon. Most […]
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Farm Credit Services of America Says 2009 Should be “Respectable Year”
Farm Credit Services of America indicated that setbacks in the swine, dairy and ethanol industries will trim this year’s financial results below the record 2008 results, however, they indicate that 2009 will still be a ‘respectable year’. This means that patronage dividends will be less than the record $60 million in 2008, but possibly more […]
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Machinery Companies Not Doing Good
Several of the farm equipment manufacturers that are publicly traded have recently posted their third quarter earnings. In most cases, these earnings were down from last year’s third quarter and in some cases, the amount was down substantially. Agco’s net income was down about 90 percent. The company blamed their earnings short fall on two […]