US weekly wheat export sales were poor. At 300kt it was at the low end of trade estimates, 300-600kt, leading up to the release of report. Soybean numbers were abysmal while corn fared a little better, but not great. The old saying is “the bulls need feeding every day” and that appeared to be the case for Chicago Soft red winter wheat futures, closing a smidge lower across all months. Hard red winter wheat found a little support, closing +3.25c/bu (AUD$1.72) higher in the Dec slot. Minneapolis spring wheat futures were flat to lower by a couple of cents / bushel.
Paris milling wheat futures were softer across the board, down €0.75/t in the Dec slot. Daytime highs are back under 30C in Germany, topping out around 26C in the far SW of the country yesterday. A welcome decline from the mid to high 30s experienced there over the last two weeks. The heat has moved east towards NW Ukraine and SE Poland, which will experience mid 30s for a day or two.
The bigger issues in Germany came from restrictions to high energy items used for cooling places like chook houses. I wonder if the death of so much poultry will be spun as the result of Climate Change, or if it will be seen as a failure of current energy policy. Some models show heat returning to Europe in the next 7-14 days, more so in Spain and France than Germany and Poland. This should just about ensure that spring sown crops like corn and spring barley in those locations has little chance of making average yields. The heat in France comes after weeks of lower than average rainfall across central and western districts. These regions had little chance of achieving average yields prior to the heat. French winter wheat yields appear to be coming in around 6.6t/ha. Although this is pretty good considering the season, it is below the European Commissions estimate of 7.05t/ha. It’s early days though, harvest starts in the SW and tracks north. At 7% complete we are only seeing limited results. Winter barley appears to be all over the shop, yields going from as much as 10t/ha to as low as 4t/ha, the average is likely to be closer to the commissions estimate of 6.6t/ha. Rapeseed also appears to have held on well, current yields vary between 1.5t/ha and 5.0t/ha, the average running close to the commissions estimate of 3.32t/ha. Still early days for the EU harvest though.