{"id":27,"date":"2026-10-24T15:16:42","date_gmt":"2026-10-24T15:16:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/fieldmarshalgroup.com\/?page_id=27"},"modified":"2026-10-24T15:17:10","modified_gmt":"2026-10-24T15:17:10","slug":"bolivian-farmland","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/fieldmarshalgroup.com\/?page_id=27","title":{"rendered":"The Case for Bolivian Farmland Now"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Eastern Bolivia Producing-Land Project<\/p>

Buy titled frontier land in Santa Cruz, convert it into productive farms and pasture, and hold it through a re-rating already underway.<\/p><\/div>

$800<\/div>
Titled land per hectare today<\/div><\/div>
$2,000+<\/div>
Developed land per hectare<\/div><\/div>
20,000 ha<\/div>
Four estates, built in phases<\/div><\/div>
20%<\/div>
Land set aside for conservation<\/div><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Commercial soybean, maize and cattle farming has already arrived<\/strong> in eastern Bolivia, but land prices have not caught up. Titled frontier land costs a fraction of mature farmland across the Brazilian border.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The plan: acquire four estates of about 5,000 hectares each, one a year, convert suitable hectares into cropland and pasture under permit, and operate them through to full production. Operations and development create the value. A market re-rating is the upside.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Led on the ground by Matias Bullrich<\/strong>, a former Morgan Stanley banker from an Argentine land and cattle family dating to 1867, with more than twenty years operating in the Chiquitan\u00eda.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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A price gap, and a record of closing it<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

In 2006 Matias Bullrich paid $50 a hectare for his reference farm. The same kind of titled land trades near $800 today, while developed cropland in Mato Grosso, across the border, sells for $10,000 to $20,000. The project buys at the bottom of that gap and builds toward the top.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

01<\/div>

Development uplift<\/h3>

Undeveloped land bought near $800 a hectare becomes productive land worth $2,000 or more.<\/p><\/div>

02<\/div>

Operating yield<\/h3>

Cash from cattle breeding, soybeans and maize, run on a model benchmarked to a working farm.<\/p><\/div>

03<\/div>

Convergence<\/h3>

The upside: Chiquitan\u00eda land re-rating toward Brazilian values. It is not the foundation.<\/p><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Why now<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
    \n
  • Bolivia has reset.<\/strong> A new government, a $1.9 billion IMF program and a floating currency. Painful for the country, a tailwind for a farm that sells in dollars.<\/li>\n\n\n
  • No export tax on grain<\/strong>, a structural edge over Argentina.<\/li>\n\n\n
  • Brazilian capital is moving in.<\/strong> Foreign agribusiness already controls over one million hectares in Santa Cruz, and Mennonite colonies have developed over 200,000 hectares.<\/li>\n\n\n
  • A catalyst is under study.<\/strong> In July 2026 Bolivia and Mato Grosso agreed to study a border road corridor. It is upside, not a base-case dependency.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n
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    An asset that moves on its own<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

    Farmland earns its place in a portfolio less for its headline return than for how little it moves with everything else. Over three decades, US institutional farmland has delivered equity-like returns at a fraction of the volatility, and it gained ground in 2022 when stocks and bonds fell together.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    10.2%<\/div>
    US farmland annual return, 1992\u20132024<\/div><\/div>
    \u22120.06<\/div>
    Correlation to US equities<\/div><\/div>
    6.8%<\/div>
    Volatility, vs 16.9% for the S&P 500<\/div><\/div>
    +9.5%<\/div>
    US farmland in 2022, when the S&P 500 fell 18% and bonds 13%<\/div><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

    Different drivers.<\/strong> Returns come from crop and rent income plus the land itself, priced on food demand and farm margins rather than earnings multiples.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    An inflation link.<\/strong> A 2025 University of Illinois study of 1970\u20132024 data found farmland returns positively correlated with inflation and largely uncorrelated or negatively correlated with equities, with the inflation link strengthening over longer holds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Institutional sizing.<\/strong> Nuveen research finds a 2\u20135% allocation to farmland and timberland can raise portfolio returns while lowering risk.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Where the cycle sits<\/h3>\n\n\n\n