A sharply lower US dollar and good weekly US export sales of soybeans saw beans
drag corn and wheat higher in overnight futures trade. Canola futures at the ICE saw
gains but not of the magnitude in the soybean pit. Paris rapeseed was mixed with
futures closing either side of unchanged.
Wheat continues to suffer the effects of a huge world wheat crop for 2016-17.
Spring wheat futures in the US did manage to close a little higher after the wheat
tour there tipped average wheat yields to be a little lower than the trade was
expecting. It should be noted that average durum yields were actually about 10%
higher than last year and were historically on the high side.
The weaker USD was attributed to slow growth figures and appeared to have a big
bearing in US market direction. Undoubtedly it will also have a big impact on local
values here come Monday as the AUD surged 1.12% against the greenback and
closed at just under 76USc.
Argentina is having trouble sowing their wheat crop. In a few spots it’s too wet to
sow and some regions that were expected to sow double crop into soybean stubble
have been unable to harvest their beans in time to sow wheat. This may be more of
an issue for Brazil than anywhere else as they buy the lions share or Argy wheat but
less wheat anywhere is good news at present.
Yesterday will go down as one of the quietest days I’ve had for long time. It is
becoming an effort to extract any kind of reasonable bid from the trade and the
consumer is simply not interested in anything. Why would they be, prices have
constantly fallen for months now. We really need to see a definitive bottom to bring
some buying interest back into this market. Even if the selling is only done by the
trade is will inherently create a short other than a consumer short and that may lead
to emotive buying at some stage.
India finally pulled the pin on chickpea contracts completely. They forced those with
open positions to close out. So much for free trade in India it appears. You can see
their reasoning though, I mean you don’t need half a billion hungry mouths beating
at your door do you. Hungry people are unhappy people and unhappy people tend
to over throw governments. There is also the other side of the equation, the
muddier the water the harder it is to see through it. Do a smell a big Indian
government purchase program for Aussie chickpeas in the future …mmmm.