From farmprogress.com:
The outlook of financial conditions for agriculture is intended to address the challenges and opportunities that likely lie ahead. However, any attempt at clarity for 2024 must begin with a review of the financial environment that prevailed during the past couple of years.
It would be difficult to find any businessperson, agricultural or otherwise, who hasn’t seen their financial situation impacted by the steady increase in interest rates. As of December 2023, the Federal Reserve has raised interest rates 11 times since the beginning of 2022, raising the Federal Funds Rate from essentially zero to 5.5%. This pace of interest rate increases hasn’t been witnessed since the early 1980s. Justification for these monetary policy moves is based largely on attempts to slow red-hot inflation that reared its ugly head in several different forms (demand-pull, cost-push, and wage-price spiral). Each type of inflation naturally emanated from the policy measures used to combat the global pandemic and stabilize a crippled economy.