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Guests & Co-Hosts

Chris Manns

Christopher Manns manages PTI Securities & Futures’ global commodities area and is a research analyst. He devotes much of his time to monitoring and analyzing the latest international commodities reports and financial research. This allows him to keep the firm’s management well informed so that they can, in turn, apprise their clients on pertinent information. Christopher has more than 18 years of securities and financial services experience. Prior to joining PTI Securities, he was a floor broker for AE Staley at the Chicago Board of Trade, and worked for the grain division of Rodman & Renshaw. He has authored many commodities articles and training materials, and speaks English, Spanish and Portuguese. Christopher earned a bachelor’s degree in economics from Catholic University of America in Washington, DC. Christopher lives with his wife in Chicago’s Gold Coast neighborhood. Read more.

Todd Dail

Todd is a fourth generation farmer from Whiteside County, Illinois. He has a farrow-to-finish operation that finishes 30,000 hogs annually, in addition, he has 1,000 acres of corn. He is serving his ninth year as an IPPA board member. Six of those he was an officer, serving as president in 2014. Todd and his wife, Rebecca, have been married for 24 years. They have one daughter, Andrea, who is in junior high.

Being a part of IPPA has opened his eyes to the pork business chain. He had the opportunity to travel to Mexico and Cuba, not only to promote pork, but to learn how others operate internationally. He was also able to meet numerous other producers that have shared their experiences, which has helped to make him a better producer.

If he could give advice to someone looking to expand into livestock production it would be to utilize all your resources. You can utilize the manure from the livestock operation for the crops and feeding the livestock your own corn; this has always made the livestock industry the original recyclers.

David Jackson

David has reported for the Chicago Tribune since 1991 except for a year at The Washington Post, where he and three colleagues were awarded the 1999 Pulitzer Prize for public service for articles on citizens shot by police. At the Tribune David was a Pulitzer finalist 4 times: For a 2014 series that showed youth were assaulted, raped and prostituted at state-funded residential treatment centers, spurring immediate reforms; for a 2011 series with Gary Marx that interviewed fugitives who live with impunity in foreign countries; for the 1999 series “How Troubled Kids Became Big Business”; and for a 1995 investigation of the Nation of Islam that spurred a federal probe of then-CHA chief Vince Lane, who was imprisoned. David and Gary’s work on fugitives was awarded the Medill Medal for Courage in Journalism.

David and Gary’s 2013 “Poverty & Profit” investigation uncovered corruption and government neglect that helped devastate a once-stable African-American community on Chicago’s West Side. A 2012 series used internal Chicago school data to show thousands of K-8 grade students miss months of school each year or vanish altogether, prompting new state laws and a legislative task force. David and Gary’s 2009 “Compromised Care” series spurred an overhaul of nursing home laws and led to new housing and programs for thousands of people with mental illness. David’s 2005 expose of mortgage fraud, “The New Street Hustle,” sparked several indictments and led to new state laws. His 2002 study, “The Human Cost of Coal Mining,” linked miner deaths to company negligence. A 2001 series on school food illness outbreaks led to a U.S. Senate-House hearing, food safety bills and a GAO report. His 2000 report on ties between police brass and crime syndicate figures showed the U.S. attorney’s office reined in a key investigation while Chicago’s internal affair squad derailed other probes.