Grain Marketing Education, News & Strategies

Highlights Crop Condition as of Sunday evening: Winter wheat is 82% harvested, 2% more than the 5 year average pace. Spring wheat is 1% harvested, 2% behind the 5 year pace. Today is the first day after the Gann Cycle technical analysis system projected a major low for CBOT commodities based on 60 year and 30 year cycle analysis. Any of you Gann analysts are welcome to share your insight. Market analyst Angie Stetzer of Consus Ag Consulting, LLC, wrote early yesterday m

Highlights August options expire this Friday. All July basis contracts and long July CBOT futures positions must be rolled or priced no later than close of business July 30th, a week from today. The weather forecast for Canada and the Corn Belt has changed to much warmer and drier. Yesterday morning Wright on the Market reported that the number of rain days in the ten-day forecast for the Western Corn Belt had 12 fewer days of rain than Sunday morning and the Eastern Corn Bel

Highlights Expectation of an event will move the market more than confirmation of the event. Yesterday, the market was trading a corn yield of 182 (USDA 181) bushels and a bean yield of 54 (USDA 52) bushels and a perfect weather forecast. The market expected both crops to gain 1% in the good or excellent categories on yesterday’s crop ratings. The market also traded a Trump presidency and that will cause a trade war with China. If all those things happen, those events

Highlights The first sentence of yesterday’s report was: "Sunday’s weather forecast indicates remnants of Hurricane Beryl will probably bring some rain to the Eastern Corn Belt over the next 7 days, where rain is really needed." We should have added, "That means corn and beans will be smartly lower today." We certainly did not expect the magnitude of the losses we saw, but a test of the contract lows on December corn at $4.12 would not have surprised us. Instead, December c

Market Comment Kevin Duling from Maupin, Oregon sent these comments to his clients yesterday afternoon about the USDA numbers: "After the selloff, I assumed numbers were horrible. They were not that bad. In fact, when it comes to the corn/soy acreage, 3.6 million acres of the total corn had not been planted as of June 1 and 12.8 million acres of soybeans had not been planted. It is very likely that at least 1-2 million acres each of corn and soybeans did not get planted becau

Highlights "North Carolina will more than likely be labeled as a State of Emergency next week or the following in regards to drought. Last rainfall we saw was 4 weeks ago, Corn started to pollinate 3 weeks ago. Most corn is tasseled but has aborted putting off an ear or silking at all. Beans are dying in the field and look terrible. Damage seems to be state wide with damage even in our darker, wetter soils in eastern NC that typically produce big yields. By far one of the wor

Highlights Agrinvest Commodities’ Eduardo Vanin yesterday morning comments: "Basis FOB Brazil and CFR China dropped quickly last week. Over the last 30 days, the roller-coaster of basis in the CFR China market has been intense. China is covered more than 80% of July shipment, but less than 15% for August. Sino is rotating stocks. A new soybean auction was announced for this week (990,000 tons). More trades were reported out of Argentina and the US Gulf during the week, but nu

Highlights The US corn crop is 95% planted vs. 91% last week. Corn is 85% emerged vs. 84% average. It is rated 74% good or excellent, 1%...

Highlights Crude oil prices dropped $2+ yesterday when Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that he is ready to suspend hostilities in the Gaza Strip for six weeks, but will not agree to a complete ceasefire. He said there are many details that need to be worked out. That means a cease-fire will probably not happen. Lowe crude oil prices mean lower prices for biofuels and that means lower prices for corn and beans. Corn planting was reported to be 91% complete vs.

Highlights Deputy Assistant to President Biden for National Security Affairs, Dalip Singh, said the United States may introduce a trade embargo against Russian goods. “The history of the embargo is not great, but as Russia completely transforms its economy into a factory for the war machine, we will come to a point where that is what we will get,” Singh said. “The military-industrial complex in Russia may now be stronger than before the outbreak of hostilities.” Singh called

Highlights From a seasonal point of view, this rally in wheat may be the last one to test recent highs or make new highs as the seasonal trend turns down in 10 calendar days and 8 business days. This weekend is a three-day weekend. Stock markets around the world are very strong as “everyone” thinks the Federal Reserve is probably going to reduce interest rates this year. Soybean basis in Brazil reached the highest value of the season yesterday +60¢ for July shipment. Last y

Highlights Planting progress: The Nation’s corn crop is 49% planted; the 5-year average is 54%. Soybeans are 35% planted; the 5-year average of 34%. Spring wheat is 61% planted; the 5-year average of 48%. Cotton is 33% planted; the 5-year average of 31%. Sorghum is 26% planted; the 5-year average of 26%. Rice is 84% planted; the 5-year average of 72%. Sugar beets are 92% planted; the 5-year average of 65%. Winter wheat crop condition is the same as a week ago at 50% good/ex

Fees As prices have firmed since February 26th, many of our clients have had conversations with merchandisers about marketing tools. From Nebraska to Upstate New York, there has been a big move to add or increase fees to initiate HTA contracts. For many years, some merchandisers had a service fee of 1 to 4¢ per bushel for HTA contracts. Many merchandisers who never charged HTA fees in the past are now and many of those who had been charging HTA fees upped the fees to as much

Highlights Some rain came into the forecast for Russia’s wheat crop which triggered profit-taking after the big gains last week. Expected rain amounts diminished as Monday turned into Tuesday. As expected by the market, the nation’s corn crop is 27% in the ground and 5% ahead of the 5-year average. Soybean planting progress is 18% complete versus the 5-year average of 10%. The spring wheat crop is 34% complete versus the 5-year average of just 19%. Sorghum is 19% plan

Highlights The seven days are expected to be very, very wet for the central US with heavy rain from Canada to Texas and from Nebraska through Indiana. Western Kansas is expected to see only light rains with Eastern Kansas to see upwards of 1 to 2 inches (26 to 52 mm). Recent forecast for rains in Kansas did not materialize. Kansas' wheat crop lost 7% from good and excellent categories, down to 36% this week. Worse yet, Oklahoma lost 11% out of the top two categories, now 4

Tidbits Yesterday’s US retail sales for March were up 0.7%, 0.4% stronger than the market expected. Retail sales for February were revised higher to show sales rebounding 0.9%, which was the largest gain in just over a year, instead of the previously reported 0.6%. That pretty much killed any chance of any interest rate cuts in 2024, much less three of them as the market had been expecting a few months ago. Today's economic numbers from China included GDP through the first

Highlights StoneX’s fertilizer guy, Josh Linville, reported yesterday afternoon India shocked the global urea market by cutting their purchase in half, down from 724,000 mts to 340,000 mts. Seldom does India buy less than a million mts and often purchases ~1.5 million mts 8 to 10 times a year. The May urea futures price (FOB NOLA) was down $30 per ton to $272.50 yesterday. There is no daily limit on urea futures. A month ago, May urea futures price was $340 per ton. Ba

Highlights The Washington Post reported yesterday a person was infected with the bird flu in Texas who had contact with infected dairy cattle. This is the first bird flu case since 2022. The cattle futures dropped like a rock following the release of the headline, but did not settle limit down. The Central US from the Gulf into Canada is expected to receive above normal rainfall over the next 14 days. Rain makes grain, especially corn. The weather forecast for rain is why c

Highlights Russian officials have halted the transport of loaded bushels sold by RIF, a top 2 exporter, due to quality issues. Market advisor, Kevin Duling of Maupin, Oregon is a wheat guy for sure. He provided us with this information last evening: It was revealed Grain Flower, the 2nd largest Russian grain exporter, could not meet quality specs on over 1 mil mts of wheat with ships in port expecting to be loaded. The Russian government would not grant phytosanitary permit

Highlights An early Monday morning shift in weather forecast increased precipitation the next 10 to 15 days for Mato Grosso, where most of Brazil’s safrinha corn and late planted beans were struggling with hot and dry conditions. SAFRAS put Brazilian bean production at 148.6 mil. mt, (USDA 155) and the Brazilian bean harvest is 62.25% complete with some delays noted in RGDS due to too much rain. Corn prices in Brazil were higher Monday supported by higher crude oil (Russi