Grain Marketing Education, News & Strategies

Tidbits Multiple weather forecasters stated yesterday conditions were forming that could produce a Derecho last night from Central South Dakota southeast through Iowa into Illinois. Yesterday morning, the USDA announced the sale of: 35,000 mt of old crop corn to unknown 194,000 mts of new crop corn to unknown 225,000 mts of new crop corn to Mexico. US and Chinese officials met Monday in Sweden, trying to agree to extend the trade truce that is set to expire August 12. T

Tidbits The U.S. struck a framework trade deal with the EU on Sunday, imposing a 15% import tariff on most EU goods, but averting a spiraling battle between the two economic powers which account for almost a third of global trade. The announcement came after European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen traveled for talks with President Trump at his golf course in Western Scotland. They shook hands on a hard-fought deal. The deal mirrors key parts of the framework agre

Tidbits Those of you who must deliver corn and beans this fall, if you have not already assessed production in your area versus normal production compared to the fall delivery basis being offered now, get with it. Normally, fall delivery basis needs to be set very late July or the first week of August. The S&P 500 and Nasdaq stock indexes closed at record highs yesterday, as optimism over strong corporate earnings outweighed ongoing trade tensions. It is very discouraging tha

Q: What are indications the soybean basis will firm? Basis will firm as demand increases and/or available supply decreases. What are the...

Tidbits New contract lows were set in corn yesterday. July set it at $4.08 and December hit a low at $4.21. The July soybean contract traded down 21½¢ to settle at $10.25¼ and November finished down 18½¢ to settle the day at $10.18½. Soybean meal and soybean oil were lower on the day. The seasonal trend is a tough one to fight with. The Argentine province of Buenos Aires received snow yesterday for the first time in 18 years. Brazil’s state of Paraná reported widespread frost

Tidbits The U.S. Special Envoy to the Middle East, Steven Wittkoff, was scheduled to meet with Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi in Tehran to discuss Iran's response to the U.S. nuclear deal proposal. The meeting was cancelled. Iran has reached out to Oman and Qatar, requesting that they mediate with Washington to halt the ongoing Israeli strikes and restart nuclear talks, a source familiar with the matter told The Jerusalem Post Sunday. Saudi Arabia is also working

Q&A: Old Crop Soybean Basis Question from a client: Thanks for all the good info in your emails. I wanted to share some local basis info and suggest you encourage farmers not to wait too long like I did to lock in basis. I sold soybeans on a July futures contract last winter and waited for the basis to improve at our local processor in Mankato, MN over the past several months it has been improving going from -.40 a few cents at a time time -.35, -.25, -.20 etc usually sta

Tidbits Corn was sharply lower yesterday because of the weekly ethanol report (see below) and the fear of Monday’s USDA acreage and inventory report as well as continued tariff rhetoric. New orders for durable goods in the U.S. unexpectedly increased $2.7 billion or up 0.9% in February versus January following an upwardly revised 3.3% jump in January. The market expected February durable goods to be down 1%. Later this morning, we will get the U.S. GDP update. The market expe

Highlights The Producer Price Index for July was reported yesterday +0.1%, better than the expected +0.2%. As a result, the dollar was sharply weaker because interest rates are more likely to be reduced sooner rather than later. A lower dollar makes US products cheaper for foreign buyers. Usually, crude oil is higher when the dollar is weaker, but it is not working that way this week. CBOT commodities used to be supported by a sharply weaker dollar, but not in 2024 and yester

Tidbits Strategies Grain lowered their EU soft wheat production estimate by 5.8 million to 116.5 million tons, 8.4% lower from 2023. The USDA expects the EU 2024/25 wheat crop to decline by 6% from the previous year to 127.4 million tons. USDA’s Foreign Agricultural Services (FAS) also revised its projection for the 2024/25 EU corn crop 4.2 million lower to 59.8 million mts. Overall, the EU is projected to produce 267.3 million tons of grain, down more than 8 million from t

Make Decision This Week About Fall Delivery Basis Last year the same recommendation was made about setting fall delivery basis in late July and again the first week in August. Several clients called the first half of September and asked if they should be setting fall delivery basis? Roger remembers one of the conversations very well and it went like this on 12 September 2023: – Should I be setting fall delivery basis on my beans? I will not have enough storage for all o

Highlights Early Friday morning CrowdStrike deployed a content update to its Falcon Sensor agents, which triggered a system-level error that prevented Windows operating systems from booting properly. This resulted in a "Blue Screen of Death" or BSOD error on many Windows systems across various sectors, including banking, healthcare, government, and critical infrastructure. There is no indication of a hack; somebody simply made a mistake. In premarket trading Friday mornin

Highlights Bloomberg reported what may go down as the most spectacular IT meltdown the world has ever seen, which occurred yesterday, was caused by a botched software update from cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike. The update crashed countless Microsoft Windows computer systems all over the world, idling airlines, banks, hospitals and even the London Stock Exchange. For several hours, bankers in Hong Kong, doctors in the UK, and emergency personnel in New Hampshire found themselv

Highlights All three wheat classes were lower yesterday, but the price free-fall was stopped by Egypt and Algeria submitted tenders to buy wheat. However, many wheat market analysts expect wheat to continue in a down trend as Northern Hemisphere harvest progress is more rapid and larger than normal. Despite the USDA increasing the size of the world wheat production by 5.5 million mts last Friday, the world will still produce less wheat than it uses this marketing year for the

Highlights Dr. Cordonnier left his yield and production estimates unchanged for US corn and beans. French Ag ministry first production estimate of the year say's France's wheat production will be 15% less than a year ago due to poor weather. Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said in remarks to Congress yesterday the U.S. is "no longer an overheated economy" as the job market has cooled and in many ways is back where it was before the health crisis. Powell told the

Highlights Weather in the crop areas of North America remains in the world's headline for grains and oilseeds followed by South American weather, Asian weather, then Eastern European weather, and lastly Western European weather. Percentage wise, we estimate 25 to 35% of the crop areas of the world are experiencing production losses due to weather. The world's weather outlook this morning is for more of the same for the coming week. If corn and bean futures are not higher t

Highlights Biden said late yesterday he will withhold weapons from Israel if it invades Rafah. Most news reports state Israel’s military went into Rafah on Tuesday. The main crude oil news yesterday was the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) reported in the morning an inventory draw-down of 1.4 million barrels for the week ending May 3rd, which was much different than last week’s build of 7.3 million barrels. On Tuesday, the American Petroleum Institute estimated

Marketing recommendations for grain May basis contracts. Wheat weather problems. IRS summary.

Market Comment From Russ, who is located in Central South Dakota very close to the North Dakota border: "Our area and surrounding areas had and having the best corn crop ever. Piles all over at elevators and some elevators only taking contract or cash sales, but not many yet. A lot in fields yet. Some piles are wet 16 to 20, but normal for our area to have those piles, just not this size in a while. So, if basis is -60 for Jan Feb, should be lock in when hauling some out, w

Originally written by Roger Wright for FarmProgress.com in September 2021 Here is why you need to be a basis seller and a futures seller,...