Optimism for U.S. biofuel outlook fades

Along with the resumption of export sales data, most notably in the form of soybean sales to China, traders and analysts had also hoped that a return to work by the federal government would mean some sort of announcement would be made regarding domestic biofuel policy from the Trump administration.

Sources had indicated that, though the government was shuttered, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) had remained hard at work in finalizing a renewable volume obligation (RVO) proposed in June and that a final proposal would be made shortly after the government reopened. This proposal, which would set an annual production floor for domestic renewable fuels like biodiesel (along with tax credit reductions on imported feedstocks that we will get to in a bit), was...