What Does Nutrien Do?

Another of my worst investments (in a portfolio not covered by this blog) is in a company called Nutrien.

Nutrien is a Canadian-based global agricultural company that provides a range of products and services to farmers and other agricultural industry stakeholders around the world. The company was formed in 2018 through the merger of PotashCorp and Agrium, two leading agricultural companies.

Nutrien’s product offerings include a wide range of crop nutrients, including potash, nitrogen, and phosphate, as well as other agricultural inputs such as seeds, crop protection products, and precision agriculture services. The company also operates a number of retail locations and distribution centers around the world, where farmers can purchase these products and receive expert advice and support. In addition to serving the needs of farmers, Nutrien also provides a range of services to other customers in the agricultural value chain, including processors, wholesalers, and retailers.

At the time of writing, Nutrien is down 16% for me. Luckily, it’s a really small portion of my overall assets.

I started a portfolio some months ago that was based on what I considered to be the lowest tier of Maslov’s Hierarchy of Needs:

• Food production (farming and farming suppliers)
• Defense (war will be funded even when the people are starving)
• Power and Infrastructure (we need electricity, always)
• Real assets (land – “they’re not making any more of it”)
• Commodities like steel and battery materials

That portfolio, on a whole, is down slightly – around 1%.

But surprisingly, it’s Nutrien (farming supplier) that is down the most. The best performer of the bunch is in the area of national defense (Raytheon).

I think I will add some more money to this position in the new year.

The five industries above are, in general, pretty safe in a recession. Not too worried about that group of stocks going into 2023.