Market News

Commercial demand supports corn, soybeans, wheat

Soybeans were higher on commercial and technical buying. Demand is strong – China bought 126,000 tons of U.S. beans and unknown destinations picked up 115,000 tons. Unknown also purchased 126,000 tons of U.S. soybean meal. All sales were for delivery during the current marketing year. The USDA’s projecting record production and yield, with an increase in ending stocks. Soybean meal was supported by that export sale and oil was firm following the rest of the soy complex.

Corn was higher on commercial and technical buying. The USDA lowered production and yield estimates slightly, but still expects new all-time highs. Those are already dialed in however and the USDA is also expected strong demand. Near and medium term forecasts look good for harvest activity in many growing areas. Ethanol futures were higher. U.S. ethanol production hit four month lows last week. The U.S. Energy Information Administration reports production was 962,000 barrels per day, down 18,000 on the week, with lower production at Midwestern plants and tighter processing margins. That decline in production and good demand pulled ethanol stocks to 19.393 million barrels, the lowest total since late 2015. Weekly export sales numbers are delaying until Friday at 8:30 AM Eastern/7:30 AM Central.

The wheat complex was higher on commercial and technical buying, along with the lower dollar. There’s a lot of wheat available, both domestically and globally, but there’s also continued buying interest near the recent lows, helping December Chicago close at a more than one month high. Still, that month remains near a multi-year low for a spot contract. Parts of the winter wheat growing region could use some precipitation, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor. SovEcon raised its crop production estimate for Russia to 119 million tons with wheat at 72 million. Ukraine’s Ag Ministry says the grain harvest is 80% complete at 46.7 million tons. Japan bought 72,000 tons of U.S. food wheat, along with 28,000 tons from Canada. Syria purchased 1 million tons of soft wheat from Russia.