US wheat futures were hit pretty hard overnight as yet another week of poor US export inspections start to confirm that the slowdown in Russian exports did not automatically convert to US boats being loaded. The punters were expecting to see 500-600kt loaded but instead they were given 357kt to chew on. This takes US annual loadings to 15.75mt, down 1.8mt on last year and now needing a weekly average of 775kt to meet the USDA target of 27.22mt, yeah na. There’s going to have to be some major adjustments to USDA numbers soon. Maybe a big drop in Aussie exports will counter a big increase in US carryover. Technically May wheat is oversold.

On the world market Bangladesh picked up 50kt of Russian milling wheat. Japan are tendering for 93kt of wheat, the majority of which is hard wheat so most likely to come from Canada.
Black Sea freight rates are a little firmer week on week but still very close to break even. The lack of offers from Russian ports for wheat to export is likely to see rates fall again through. The domestic market in Russia is now paying more for wheat than the export market. French wheat has been able to work into export sales at cheaper rates than Russian wheat. For instance FOB values of French wheat are roughly US$234 / tonne versus US$240 for similar Russian wheat. US wheat at US$230 FOB is still cheap at a FOB level but freight rates for Russian and French wheat are much more comparable than US rates, which are about double what Russia and France would pay to most major consumers.