Old crop wheat and corn futures at Chicago were generally flat to lower in overnight trade. Corn a smidge higher, wheat a smidge lower. Soybeans where a smidge higher on the old crop while new crop were a touch lower, nothing really convincing in either direction.
The big mover was the canola futures market on the ICE. May futures for Canadian canola pushed C$10.40 higher taking back some of the previous two sessions losses. Let’s see if the local guys follow this move. New crop canola futures were even firmer with gains of C$16.60 in the January 2022 slot. It should be noted that there is still a C$100 difference between nearby canola futures and futures for Nov 2021.
Cash bids for canola out of SW Saskatchewan moved in unison with futures, with a Feb lift gaining C$7.13 to C$627.74 ex farm. On the back of an envelope this is equivalent to canola being worth about AUD$700 port Newcastle.
Staying with values out of SW Saskatchewan we see 1CWAD13 values were steady at C$307.40 for a March lift. Using similar maths but switching the end user destination to somewhere like Italy this would compare with an AUD port price close to AUD$380 for DR1.
The Russian wheat crop went into winter in less than perfect conditions and was quiet vulnerable to winter kill. The winter across much of the major wheat regions hasn’t been too bad and winter kill hasn’t been much of a problem thus far. Recent snowfall has covered some of the crop and will give much needed moisture to the emerging wheat in spring.
Russian and Ukraine exports of wheat and barley are all but finished for 2020-21. This should leave Australia in the box seat to fill the latest Saudi tender for 480kt of barley. CBH also sold 35kt of malt to Mexico, this is said to be the first Aussie malt sale to Mexico.