Ag banker Tony Gudajtes can sleep well at night. With an amazing crop and robust commodity prices, Gudajtes has few worries about the loan portfolio. “I’ve been in banking 26 years now and this will be by far the best economic conditions I’ve seen for farmers,” said Gudajtes. “The asset classes all inflating; land is double (in value), beet stock is strong, the machinery is probably appreciating rather than depreciating. We’re sitting on great working capital positions because of the crop and very strong price.” Gudajtes is the executive vice president and ag market president for Choice Bank. This may be a once-in-a-lifetime year for some farmers and the time to make improvements on the farm. “Farmers typically want to get bigger, better, faster, more. They know they need to upgrade a couple tractors or combine and the landlord has been bugging me about this quarter of land that he wants to sell me. Get that wish list together, that’d be my advice.” With rising interest rates, the cost of money has gone up. Gudajtes says that must be a consideration as farmers prepare their cash flows for next year.
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