Trump Says the US Will Keep Buying Canadian Potash. Nutrien Took Back Half the Drop
Nutrien closed at $106.23 on Tuesday, September 22, 2026, up $1.74 or 1.67%, a day after a Truth Social post about a Belarusian potash deal took 3.21% off the stock. During that same session the President told reporters the United States would keep buying Canadian potash, and the reason he gave for raising Belarus at all was price rather than supply. Price data as of that close. Source: StockAnalysis.
Two positions, a day apart
Monday, on Truth Social: “The United States is working on a massive Deal with respect to the purchase of Potash from Belarus.” And: “The pricing would be for substantially less than we are currently paying to Canada, very good news for our Farmers and Ranchers.”
Tuesday, speaking to reporters during a bilateral meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy at the United Nations General Assembly in New York, quoted by The Canadian Press: “We’ll continue to go with Canada, but Belarus would like to sell it for a much lower price.” He added: “Belarus has a lot of potash, and our farmers need good prices, and we want to get a lower price.”
Half the drop, not all of it
Monday took $3.46 off the stock and closed it at $104.49. Tuesday returned $1.74, which is 50.3% of it. Before Monday’s fall Nutrien stood at $107.95, so Tuesday’s close of $106.23 is still 1.59% below where the stock sat before the post. That is the honest version of “recovered”.
The remarks came during Tuesday’s session and the Canadian Press report carrying them is timestamped 5:09 p.m. ET. The gain and the remarks fell in the same session, which is all we can say.
What Tuesday settles
We set out the sanctions argument behind Monday’s drop yesterday: the plan fails on volume, contracts and freight, not on sanctions law, which had already been lifted. Tuesday’s remarks do not change that, but they do make it less relevant, because displacement is no longer the stated aim.
What is not settled is the thing he did state. He named price twice, and an intention to pay less needs no agreement, no route and no tariff change to persist. Both days produced positions rather than documents, and the position moved from taking volume away to paying less for it.
The risk moved from volume to price
That matters because of where the potash price already is.
| Year | Average MOP price, dollars per metric ton of K2O equivalent, f.o.b. mine |
|---|---|
| 2021 | $650 USD |
| 2022 | $980 USD |
| 2023 | $620 USD |
| 2024 | $690 USD |
| 2025 (estimate) | $600 USD |
Source: US Geological Survey, Mineral Commodity Summaries, February 2026, POTASH, page 1.
The 2025 estimate of $600 USD is 38.8% below the 2022 average of $980 USD, by our arithmetic on those two figures. The pressure is for a lower price on a commodity whose recorded average has already fallen by more than a third from the spike.
Potassium chloride and potassic fertilizers already enter the United States at a Normal Trade Relations tariff rate of Free, and potash was added to the US Final 2025 List of Critical Minerals, published in the Federal Register on November 7, 2025 at 90 FR 50494.
The dependence behind it has not moved. The USGS puts 2025 US imports for consumption at 5,600 thousand tonnes of K2O equivalent against domestic mine production of 500, for net import reliance of 92%, a level it has held at 92% to 94% since 2021. Canada supplied 79% of those imports over 2021 to 2024.
What price pressure touches at Nutrien
Restated from yesterday rather than re-argued: North America is 23.4% of Nutrien’s second-quarter potash volumes and carries a $36 USD per tonne premium over offshore, worth roughly $33 million USD on the quarter, about 5.0% of potash adjusted EBITDA. Those are product tonnes from Nutrien’s Q2 2026 release of August 5, 2026, not the K2O equivalent basis used above.
The exposure sits in the netback on about a fifth of the tonnes, which is the line price pressure works on. Nutrien and its potash business are covered at length in our survey of Canadian mining stocks, which is where the earnings question belongs rather than the headline one.
Carney’s 40% and the production number
Prime Minister Mark Carney, also in New York for the General Assembly, said Canada supplies “40 per cent of the world’s potash” and called it “an incredible strength of our economy”, saying Canada would continue to be the largest supplier of potash to the United States as a reliable, cost-competitive supplier.
The USGS measures mine production: Canada produced 15,000 of the world’s 49,000 thousand tonnes of K2O equivalent in 2025, which is 30.6% by our arithmetic. The two are different measures. The Prime Minister’s figure describes supply to the world market, the USGS number describes what comes out of the ground. We have not sourced a Canadian share of world supply, so we are not putting a number on his measure.
What would be an escalation
A signed offtake agreement with volumes and dates would be one. A potash tariff line moving off Free would be another. Neither has happened, and a tariff would work against the price aim he stated on Tuesday rather than for it.
Price pressure is the part that requires none of that, and it is the part this week left in place.
Disclaimer
Disclaimer: The content on bestcanadianstocks.ca is for informational and entertainment purposes only and does not constitute financial advice. Past performance is not indicative of future results. Always consult a qualified financial advisor before making investment decisions. Share prices from StockAnalysis, closes of Monday September 21 and Tuesday September 22, 2026. Company potash segment figures, in product tonnes and US dollars, from Nutrien’s second quarter 2026 results release of August 5, 2026. World potash mine production, US import, consumption, price and tariff figures, all on a thousand-metric-tons-of-K2O-equivalent basis, from the US Geological Survey Mineral Commodity Summaries, February 2026, POTASH chapter, pages 1 and 2. President Trump’s Tuesday remarks as reported by The Canadian Press on September 22, 2026, and his Monday post as quoted in our September 22 coverage. Prime Minister Carney’s remarks as reported by CTV News.
