Market News

Soybeans, corn up, expecting more planting delays

Soybeans were higher on short covering and technical buying. Contracts were back in positive territory after Tuesday’s drop connected to rumors about the next round of trade aid, continuing to watch the weather. More planting delays are probable, but there’s also an increasing chance of higher bean acreage because of the corn and spring wheat delays. The lingering uncertainty about China is an additional question mark and the USDA details about the next round of trade aid are coming shortly, telling producers not to change planting intentions because of the anticipated payments. Unknown destinations bought 131,000 tons of U.S. beans, with 110,000 tons for 2018/19 and 21,000 tons for 2019/20. The USDA’s weekly export sales report is out Thursday morning. Soybean meal and oil followed beans higher. The USDA’s attaché in Ottawa lowered its canola export outlook for Canada because of trade tensions with China.

Corn was firm to modestly higher on short covering and technical buying after a relatively quiet up and down session. Forecasts have more planting delaying rain in key U.S. growing areas, with more talk of record prevent plant acres and acreage loss. The weather is also restricting interior barge movement but supporting basis bids. The trade is waiting for the next step on the USMCA. Ethanol futures were weak. The U.S. Energy Information Administration says ethanol production averaged 1.071 million barrels a day, up 19,000 on the week for the highest average sine August 2018, while stocks jumped 1.154 million barrels to 23.404 million.

The wheat complex was mixed, with Chicago and Kansas City down on profit taking and technical selling. Contracts were due for a correction and the fundamentals remain bearish with the end of the 2018/19 marketing year rapidly approaching. Soft red winter is still wet, hard red winter development is still behind average, and spring wheat planting is still slow. That slow spring wheat planting pace helped Minneapolis shrug off some of the bearish tone in the complex. The rumors about a trade aid package for wheat were shrugged off as U.S. wheat hasn’t really been impacted all that greatly by trade tensions. Mexico has lifted tariffs on U.S. goods. DTN says Jordan is tendering for 120,000 tons of milling wheat and the Philippines bought 45,000 tons of feed wheat.