Corn futures at Chicago were hit hard last night but still managed to close the week a few cents higher than where they started. Wheat futures were soft to flat with SRWW at the Chicago losing the most of the three main US grades. Soybeans followed corn lower as planting conditions in N.America look favourable.
There’s a USDA WASDE report out on Tuesday night, the punters are not expecting too many surprises in that report but will probably look to head into the session fairly neutral until the data is out. The next major report that hits the wires in the US Planting Intentions report due out on the 31st of March.
Corn found weakness from outside markets and thoughts that S.America will harvest a large corn crop and at current price levels may elect to carry significant stocks forward, thus competing with US product later in the year. Corn also found weakness from the lack of Chinese business. China has always stated that they will buy from the US if they are price competitive regardless of any trade deals. Presently China continue to favour the S.American product on price.
There was talk that China may pick up some US wheat after giving tariff exemptions but the punters remain concerned about China’s zero ergot policy.
Weekly wheat exports out of Russia fell away with movement to both Egypt and Turkey smaller. Shipments are sitting at about 25.8mt bang on the 3 year average. France rated there winter wheat crop 64% G/E, winter barley rated at 65% G/E, nothing to worry about there.