Sometimes you can look through the USDA WASDE data and think “yeah, fair enough, looks about right”, other times you just kind of sit there with one eyebrow cocked wondering what the USDA have been putting in their coffee.
Last night’s report  had some good bit and some not so good bits. Wheat was on the not so good news side of the ledger this time around.  A quick look at the global data shows carry in up 3.73mt, production up 3.37mt, usage up, but basically everything rolling through to an increase in ending stocks of 4.16mt. We needed to see this lower not higher to keep upward price momentum.
Slower than expected exports seems to be the common theme throughout the wheat sheet. Major exporters beginning stocks increased by 3.44mt. Argentina is a good example, production is estimated to reduce 500kt to 20mt but carry in was increased from 2.52mt to 3.19mt.
Canadian wheat production was lowered just 1mt to 23mt. Russian wheat production was left unchanged at 72.5mt. Australian production was increased 1.5mt to 31.5mt.
The report had the impact expected on futures values with Chicago soft red winter wheat futures slipping. It was interesting to see hard red winter wheat futures and spring wheat futures did not experience the decline that soft red wheat did. Spring wheat futures in the US were actually a little higher a move reflected in Canadian cash prices.
1CWAD13 durum cash bids were again sharply lower, shedding C$19.50 in the December slot. French durum values into the Mediterranean were also a little lower, shedding roughly US$10 or so but still converting to a rough Aussie price equivalent to about AUD$609 port.