Wheat futures at Chicago, Minneapolis, London and Paris all took a hit last night.
US hard red winter wheat was the worst off. Futures at Chicago for HRWW falling 19.5c/bu nearby Dec24, AUD$10.61/t at this morning’s exchange rate which is also up 0.71%, not helping the day to day conversion of things. Paris milling wheat shed €4.50 / tonne nearby, at this morning’s exchange rate to the Euro that about AUD$7.42 / tonne.
There’s a little rain forecast for the US plains this week, mainly across the HRWW belt but also some heavy falls are expected across the eastern spring wheat belt. Overnight, after the close, the USDA released this weeks crop progress report. It estimates the US spring wheat crop harvest at 92% complete, with much of the area expected to see falls of rain between 95% and 100% complete, thus this rainfall is largely beneficial to the sowing of winter wheat. It may create a few delays to row crop harvest though. Corn harvest in the north is really yet to strike a blow while progress in Kansas and Nebraska is generally progressing at an average to above average pace. The “I” states are just kicking off their harvest program, so rain will not be welcome.

There was talk of another region in the Russian spring wheat belt declaring a state of emergency. Reports of some producers only able to harvest 15%-20% of this years crop could leave many producers cash strapped, possibly unable to sow as much of the 2025 crop as they had initially expected too. A quick look at WorldAgWeather.com shows that this week should be much drier. Some regions of southern Siberia have seen rainfall totals in excess of 400% of average over the last 30 days. Northern Kazakhstan, although also seeing well above average August / September rainfall is not as bad, but there are still reports of substantial crop losses in places. Interesting to note that the 30 day average rainfall anomaly for parts of Turkey is also very high, the wettest regions also the major durum producing regions, total volume of rain doesn’t appear to be excessive though. Flooding continues in central Europe.