US wheat futures gave back a large slice of the weeks gains to date. Not that it may have much of an impact here on local prices. The recent moves have hardly been reflected in new or old crop wheat bids here. Local APW / Chicago SRWW basis was smashed yesterday shedding roughly 28c/bu. To you and I that’s a fall in the premium local APW had been bid over Chicago futures of roughly AUD$15.65/tonne at today’s exchange rate. Remember the good old days when local prices actually moved up and down in unison with the US market, a distant memory now days.
I’m torn between liking the new and old myself. The US futures markets reflects two things, US domestic conditions and a little of the international crop condition, and the flow of speculative money. Probably more the later than the former these days. The volatility of the distant past did offer some nice opportunities, sometimes, but the stability of the current system where physical markets are less responsive to moves in futures does offer some degree of …. well stability. This does tend to stagnate the local physical market at times though, as we are currently seeing.
The sell off in US wheat futures was technical in nature… again. Weekly US wheat exports reached 585kt, that is towards the higher end of trade estimates prior to the reports release. The US weekly exports sales and shipment numbers are now ahead of last years pace. US wheat remains competitive into the Asian market, but HRWW remains just a few dollars lower than the Aussie old crop H2 equivalent.
Canadian cash values ex farm SE Saskatchewan were generally lower, nearby more so than December. 1CWRS13.5 milling wheat fell on average CAD$3.16/.tonne nearby, while a Dec lift was back just CAD$1.21 / tonne on average.
Canadian canola was sharply lower, volatility is still a major feature of the Canadian canola market. SE Sask cash values slipped CAD$17.24 / tonne for a September lift while a Dec lift was back CAD$14.94 / tonne on average. The fall in physical canola was in line with moves in Winnipeg canola futures which shed CAD$15.00 nearby and CAD$14.80 in the Jan26 slot. Paris rapeseed was also lower, shedding €7.75 /tonne nearby and €3.75/t in the Feb slot.