Wednesday, February 18, 2009

Yeah - and my weight has increased "significantly"...

This winter.  A curious omission in the profit report from Deere.
Worldwide agricultural sales are projected to fall about 2 percent as the dollar strengthens and farmers grapple with higher credit costs. Sales in Western Europe are now expected to fall as much as 15 percent and “decline significantly” in Central Europe and the Commonwealth of Independent States, including Russia. South American sales may fall as much as 25 percent, wider than the 20 percent decline the company projected in November. [More]
So, why do we have percentage projections on demand from lots of places, except Russia, et al.?  I have no idea, but if they were looking to highlight this fact, they accomplished their mission.

My guess is "significantly" means "you don't wanna know".  Or maybe, like the rest of us, they don't have a clue.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

John,
Do you think, with the present economy, that land rental rates or land sales prices will decrease "significantly"?

John Phipps said...

anon:

I'm all over the place on this one. I'll post later on rents from stuff I heard just yesterday.

Land prices seem to have some inertia to remain strong for some time, I think.

Anonymous said...

John,
Thanks for the advice, "land prices remain strong". We have an auction next week in our community of some farmland. Guess we should keep bidding til the other guy quits! Would like to read soon what you are hearing on rental rates.