Market News

Rain in parts of Midwest sends soybeans, corn lower

Soybeans were lower on speculative and technical selling. Contracts gave back Wednesday’s gains, and then some. Most forecasts have moderate to cool temperatures and at least some rain in the parts of the Midwest and Plains over the next couple of days. Most 6-10 day outlooks also generally look moderate with scattered rain. With about a month left in the 2016/17 marketing year, weekly export numbers were bullish. U.S. beans continue to maintain a par with Brazil for price. Soybean meal and oil followed beans lower.

Corn was lower on speculative and technical selling. Corn was also watching the weather, with most of the crop at or very close to key development phases. Rainfall was very welcome in some prime U.S. corn growing areas, especially parts of Iowa that were recently classified as in a state of drought. It still early August, but there are concerns about an early frost, at least in parts of the region. Old crop exports were a new marketing year low because of South American competition. Ethanol futures were steady to lower. The USDA’s attaché in Argentina projects 2017/18 corn production at 40.5 million tons, with exports at 29.5 million tons. Both are larger than the current official estimates.

The wheat complex was lower on speculative and technical selling. Rain the southwestern Plains should help ahead of winter wheat planting and parts of the Dakotas are also seeing rain. That’ll help part of the spring wheat crop, but much of the northern Plains should remain dry, with parts of the region seeing wildfires and even extreme heat. Weekly export numbers were neutral with a new marketing year low for sales against good shipments. Japan bought 50,080 tons of U.S. food wheat, along with 49,665 tons from Canada and 33,180 tons from Australia. Jordan purchased 50,000 tons of optional origin milling wheat. The USDA’s Argentina attaché sees the 2017/18 wheat crop at 16.65 million tons.