The hangover from the cold snap in the US came out in the reports today, with weekly export inspections for wheat falling significantly.
US wheat export inspections for the week ending the 25th came in at 272,820 tonnes. The Pacific Northwest made up the lions share with 81k of HRW and 81k of soft white wheat. The Gulf ports making up just 17k of weekly wheat inspections.
Volume of corn and soybeans out of the Gulf was good though. 1.6mt of corn left the US, about 938k of that was out of the Gulf.
Interesting to note that 121k of sorghum was also shipped. The bulk of that out of S.Texas. Sorghum was offered FOB Texas at US$345. On the back of an envelope that’s rough equivalent to AUD$480 delivered port Newcastle. US ocean rates from the Gulf to China were up US$4.00 last week.
New crop Argentine sorghum is offered onto the market at US$215 FOB. That’s about US$30 cheaper than old crop values. Working the Argie product into China converts to a delivered Newcastle equivalent price of something like AUD$320. This does tend to indicate that not only is Australian wheat some of the cheapest in the world but potentially so is our sorghum hence the interest from every trader.
Sorghum production in Argentina is expected to reach 2.5mt this autumn. Yields are up, averaging around 4.11 tonnes per hectare according to a recent report from Nuseed.
Chinese demand will be key to both Argentine and Australian values prior to the US sorghum harvest in September.
A combination of the stronger US dollar and poor US export data will need to be countered by some good news to see upside this week.