21/12/21 Prices
International durum prices are mixed, French higher, Canadian lower. The Canadian product has been priced much higher than the French product for a while now. Quality a major price differential. The drought in Canada also had a huge impact on Canadian values as the US and Canadian domestic market took their share leaving the export durum market to fight over the balance.
With US and Canadian domestic demand at about 2.9mt and N.American supply at roughly 3.65mt (0.75mt carry in). Canadian exports are pegged at about 2.3mt (including US @1.25mt). You can see the balance sheet is very tight, the tightest since 1984.
About 70% of the Canadian crop went No1 grade, all up the average protein was 15.9%, very high.
Global production is pegged at 31mt and global demand at 33.2mt. Quality problems in the Australian crop will see more pressure on Canadian product possibly pushing their ending stocks lower than the predicted 450kt. This brings up the question just how much bread wheat will be used to blend with durum in 2022.
In the USA wheat futures were generally flat. The trade expect to see more agronomic analysis from the recent storm damage over the break. Some are predicting some major adjustments to area in the worst hit counties while others are talking of how resilient the winter wheat is and that spring conditions will be the determining factor. I guess it is hard for a wheat plant to recover if it has been blown two counties away. The next decision these producers have to make is whether to resow with winter wheat or wait until spring and sow a summer crop into the field.