- We have seen mixed trade in Chicago today and with just over an hour to go we see corn and soybeans lower whilst wheat prices are about unchanged. Wheat prices were buoyed early with some fresh fund short covering although they appear less enthusiastic about covering their corn shorts today than appeared to be the case yesterday. This coming Friday’s CFTC report is likely to again show huge wheat short positions and this creates a vulnerability, particularly as we are approaching the USDA’s May WASDE report. Farmers and traders are fully aware of the fund short in wheat and are consequently not currently making sales, this is market supportive.
- Turkey (the world’s largest wheat miller) has been a significant buyer of Russian wheat due to competitive prices and proximity. Turkish wheat production is expected to be down around 10% in 2017 due to extreme weather, which is likely to boost demand for world wheat. As a new crop is being made, Russia wants to make sure that it remains the largest and most important wheat supplier to Turkish mills.
- Brazilian calendar soybean exports (January-April) are estimated to be up 5.1 million mt from last year’s record level. This pace is largely due to China, as they continue to ramp up their soybean purchase and shipping pace. Also, even with their record large export pace, ship loading delays have been minimal, which is a testament to Brazil’s huge investment in port logistics. Today, a Chinese crusher can secure a panamax size vessel and start loading by the end of the week. This is a big structural change that places Brazil on par with the US Gulf logistics.
- Cold temperatures continue to plague Canadian farmers in their plans to harvest the remainder of the crop that was left in the field from last autumn and commence spring cultivation work. The cold snap now looks to last into mid May which is pushing seeding to the last half of May. Spring wheat/canola (rapeseed) futures are more closely watching weather updates for direction with canola up against four year highs.
- The latest US wheat crop condition data has been released as follows:
