Market News

Soybeans higher with new export sale to China

Soybeans were higher on commercial and technical buying, continuing to buy back Monday’s losses. The harvest made a solid week to week advance, with favorable conditions expected in many areas. Northern parts of the Midwest and Plains have received some rainfall, but the weather looks clear around most of the rest of the region. In South America, recent rainfall has helped parts of Brazil, but coverage doesn’t seem to have been as widespread as expected and planting has been pushed back in some of their biggest production regions. More rain is possible this weekend. Those delays in Brazil are expected to extend China’s reliance on U.S. beans into 2021. China bought 264,000 tons of 2020/21 U.S. beans, the first announced sale of U.S. beans since the 8^th. The USDA’s weekly export sales numbers are out Friday. Soybean meal and oil were mostly higher, the exceptions were the now expired October contracts, following the lead of beans. The NOPA’s monthly member crush report for September could show the lowest monthly total of the year, with an average estimate of 160.795 million bushels.

Corn was mixed on commercial spread adjustments, with December through July 2021 higher and the remaining months lower. Corn is also watching harvest activity, expecting good progress in many key growing areas over the next several days. The slow soybean planting in Brazil is expected to push back second crop corn planting at least a couple of weeks. Weather is also an issue in parts of Argentina. China bought 420,000 tons of 2020/21 U.S. corn as that nation continues efforts to boost feed supplies. China has already passed the USDA’s import projection of 7 million tons for the current marketing year, but most of that still needs to be shipped. Beijing has not announced a rumored increase in the corn import quota and some private firms have much larger import expectations than the USDA. Ethanol futures were higher. The U.S. Energy Information Administration’s weekly ethanol production and supply numbers are out Thursday.

The wheat complex was higher on short covering and technical buying, bouncing back from early mixed activity, with help from the weak dollar. Dry parts of Russia could see some rain, but chances remain low for Argentina and the U.S. Plains. APK-Inform lowered grain production and export outlooks for Ukraine. Dry areas of Australia have at least some rain in the forecast, while wet parts of the European Union could see a drier pattern. The USDA could make some significant adjustments to the global production outlook in the next set of supply and demand estimates, out November 10^th. U.S. winter wheat planting and emergence are ahead of average. DTN says Algeria bought 510,000 tons of wheat from an unknown origin. The USDA’s attaché in Pakistan sees better prospects for winter wheat planting following a higher than normal monsoon season, with production estimates at 25.7 million tons, compared to 24.3 million in 2019/20. Imports are expected to be 1 million tons this marketing year, with the office reporting the running total for imports is already 600,000 tons.