Corn and soybean prices face pressure from three directions over the next few months: yields and production, export demand, and energy policy, according to Dr. Megan Roberts, an agricultural economist with Compeer Financial.

Recent price fluctuations have made the market's direction difficult to predict, Roberts says. "So certainly yields and production (will factor into prices). We are, as a nation according to the last USDA," she noted, pointing to federal data as the baseline for sizing the crops ahead.

For growers, the calculus is straightforward. Production estimates flow directly into balance sheets, and balance sheets set the price floor under new-crop contracts. Compeer Financial, a farm credit cooperative serving producers in Illinois, Minnesota and Wisconsin, has a front-row view of how those numbers land on farm margins once producers sit down with their lenders.

Roberts frames the outlook around factors growers already track. Yields and production come first. Export movement comes second. Energy policy sits third on the list, a reminder that biofuel demand — tied to decisions made in Washington as much as in the field — can shift the demand side of the corn balance sheet quickly.

The distinction matters for marketing plans. Condition reports and projections are one thing; harvested results are another. Roberts anchors her read on USDA figures rather than sentiment, treating government numbers as data to be checked rather than accepted at face value. The last USDA reports shape where the nation stands on production, and the next round of figures will test whether the market's recent volatility resolves into a trend.

Volatility itself is the defining feature of the current market. Wide swings in both corn and soybean prices complicate decisions on when to price new-crop bushels, how aggressively to forward contract, and whether to store grain and pay the carrying costs. An economist's caution about the difficulty of forecasting direction is, in effect, advice to keep flexibility in the marketing plan.

For input planning, the same uncertainty cuts both ways. Price moves driven by export demand or energy policy can land on the revenue side faster than producers can adjust their cost side, which is where margin risk builds. That is the practical stake behind Roberts's list of drivers: each factor represents a channel through which external decisions — by foreign buyers and by policymakers — reach the farm gate.

Compeer's interest in the question reflects its lending book. When crop prices swing, repayment capacity swings with them, and farm credit institutions watch the same USDA reports and export data that growers do.

Roberts's message leaves producers with a watch list rather than a forecast: monitor the upcoming USDA production and yield updates, track export sales as they are reported, and follow energy policy developments that could reshape biofuel demand for corn. How those three variables settle over the next few months will determine whether corn and soybean prices find firmer footing or keep traders and growers guessing.