Contributors

Joe Vaclavik is the founder of Standard Grain and host of the Grain Markets and Other Stuff podcast/YouTube channel. He spent the first 13 years of his career at the Chicago Board of Trade prior to relocating to Tennessee in 2018. Joe has dedicated his 20+ year career to farmer education with regard to markets and grain marketing. He is a graduate of the University of Illinois with a degree in Agribusiness, Farm, and Financial Management.

Mackenzie Johnston is a fifth-generation rancher located in Central Nebraska. Her family operates a red Angus commercial cow-calf operation in the Sandhills. Besides ranching, her career has been centered around communications in the agriculture industry. Mackenzie has experience working for breed associations, cattle organizations, and agricultural publications. She is a graduate of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln with a degree in Animal Science and Business.

Paul Neiffer, CPA is the primary author of the www.farmcpareport.com blog and writes a column and weekly podcast for Top Producer magazine and provides other written material for various other farm publications. Paul is also a frequent contributor to AgriTalk and has a Thursday morning segment on RFD TV. Paul consults with farmers regarding income tax planning, estate tax planning and issues related to succession. Paul also advises farmers on farm service agency planning. Paul teaches over 1,000 CPAs and other tax professionals each year. Paul obtained a Business Administration degree from the University of Washington.

[email protected]
www.agmarket.net

Matt Bennett is a co-founder of AgMarket.Net. He is also a Windsor, Illinois, farmer and former grain elevator owner.
Matt brings the producer perspective to the table, enriched with his extensive grain marketing background. He specializes in formulating risk-management strategies for corn, soybean farmers and livestock producers.
Matt’s analysis and commentary on the grain markets appears on various TV and radio stations across the Midwest, including “Market to Market”, “U.S. Farm Report” and “Agribusiness Today”.
A graduate of University of Illinois, Matt and his wife Tiffany live on the family’s centennial farm north of Windsor, where they are raising their five children. He owns and operates a 3,000-acre corn and soybean farm with his father while raising 30 head of registered Angus cows.

[email protected]

www.agviewsolutions.com

Chris B. Barron is the Director of Operations and President of Carson and Barron Farms, Inc. which is located in Rowley, Iowa, “Northeast Iowa”

Chris graduated from the University of Dubuque in 1992 with a degree in Communications. In 1992, Chris, along with his brother-in-law took over their Pioneer Sales agency which had been run by his father for the past 22 years. Today the Pioneer agency is still an integral part of their operation. Chris has over 25 years of experience working with and understanding customer needs while at the same time steadily growing their own farming operations.

Over the last 25 years, Chris has developed many decision tools to help producers improve the profitability of their operation. Most notably, he developed “Profit Manager” which is a tool used by hundreds of corn and soybean producers across the Corn Belt.

Most recently, Chris has developed a new business model to assist producers with Multi-Generational Growth through the business “Ag View Solutions LLC.” Chris has implemented this plan into his own family’s farming operation with the mission of improving quality of life and maximizing profit opportunities. Chris and his wife Alissa, along with Shay Foulk, work as a team consulting across the country helping Ag businesses and farmers with multiple business decisions including networking, merging, value assessment, and margin management.

[email protected]
www.agmarket.net

Brian Splitt is a co-founder of AgMarket.Net. He began his career in the financial services industry in 2004 with expertise in insurance products, stocks, bonds, mutual funds and annuities. In 2007, Splitt joined Allendale Inc where he transitioned to the commodity industry. He is a regular contributor to US Farm Report, This Week in Agribusiness, RFDTV and AgriTalk After the Bell. Brian is a combat veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom as well as a member of a Gold Star Family. Brian deployed to Iraq with 1st Marine Division for the initial invasion in 2003 and spent several years training others while he served as a Marine Combat Instructor of Water Survival.

[email protected]

www.agviewsolutions.com

Shay Foulk is an agricultural business consultant with Chris Barron at Ag View Solutions. He specializes in budgets, profit management, business structuring, and transition planning. He also facilitates farmer and ag business peer groups.

Jim Iuorio is a managing director of TJM Institutional Services and a veteran futures and options trader. Jim’s 36 year career has been spent brokering futures and options trades for large institutional clients in equity indexes, interest rate products, commodities and foreign exchange. His recommendations to clients blend macroeconomic themes with technical analysis to identify trading opportunities, anomalies in options markets or hedging strategies. Jim is also an active trader of futures, equities, ETFs, and options for his own account. Jim is a 1987 graduate of the University of Illinois with a B.A. in economics and is a frequent guest presenter at financial conferences and events. Follow Jim Iuorio on Twitter @jimiuorio.

Peter Meyer is a Principal/Crops Economist with Muddy Boots Ag LLC. Mr. Meyer’s career spans almost 40 years in agriculture, having traded grains and oilseeds as a broker and proprietarily on the floor of the Chicago Board of Trade before holding the position of Agricultural Products Specialist at both Lehman Brothers and JP Morgan. Before forming Muddy Boots Ag, he spent 12 years as the Head of Grains, Oilseeds and Advanced Feedstocks Analytics at S&P Global.

Known for his hands-on, pragmatic style, Peter provides unbiased analysis of agricultural markets to end users, producers, and investment firms throughout the world. His 2020 expansion into advanced feedstocks analysis has made him a go to source of information for energy companies in the ethanol, renewable diesel, and sustainable aviation fuels business. Pete also lends his opinions on the broader agriculture economy to major US universities and annually participates as a scout on crop tours, logging over ten thousand miles yearly in crop inspections.

Mr. Meyer has appeared on CNBC, US Farm Report, AgriTalk and various other media outlets as well as being quoted in print media such as the Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, Reuters, Bloomberg, Farm Journal, and others. In-person and virtual presentations have been provided for the US Grains Council, South Dakota Wheat Commission, Geneva (Switzerland) Grains Conference, JP Morgan, S&P Global and various state corn and soybean associations to name a few.