Marysville, Ohio-Scotts Miracle-Gro Co. said Sept. 17 that fertilizer commodities have stabilized, and it believes they are at more normalized historical levels. “As we look forward to next year, we’re not looking for much volatility,” said Dave Evans, Scotts’ executive vice president and CFO, speaking to analysts at the C.L. King & Associates Best Ideas Conference. “We think they are going to remain fairly consistent with where they’re at today and we’re actively engaged in forward buying, hedging, using different strategies to try and lock down these costs at this point. We do expect to be about 65-70 percent locked at the end of our fiscal year on our largest item – urea.” Evans said it is still likely the lower prices for commodities will only have a neutral impact on Scotts next year, as its costs are averaged over the course of a full year. The company’s fiscal year ends in September. Any impact of stable commodities is expected to be neutral, however, according to Evans, who said that these costs are averaged over an entire year.
Transparency Across the Fertilizer Value-Chain