BASIC & RECENT MARKET INFO

Tidbits Ukrainian President Zelensky and U.S. President Trump expressed hope that their White House summit yesterday with European leaders could eventually result in trilateral talks with President Putin over ending Russia’s war on Ukraine. Meanwhile, the war continues with no end in sight. Flash sale: Yesterday morning, the USDA announced the sale of 124,000 mts of new crop corn to unknown. Pesticides:  The Make America Healthy Again Commission expects to recommend no action

Tidbits Russia-Ukraine:  On the surface, Trump’s meeting with President Putin was a total failure. Trump had said he wanted a cease fire in Russia’s war with Ukraine and a framework for a lasting peace. The culture of Eastern Europe and a lack of a Ukrainian representative made Trump’s goals highly unlikely. The anti-Trumper news media is jumping all over this failure. However, Trump and Putin showed friendliness and mutual respect at their press conference. Trump was asked t

Tidbits Crude oil  prices surged nearly another 3% on Thursday amid escalating air strikes between Israel and Iran and uncertainty over U.S. involvement. Tensions escalated as Israel bombed nuclear targets in Iran, which responded with missile and drone attacks on Israel, with no clear exit strategy from either side. Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu warned Tehran of severe consequences, and Iran cautioned against third-party interference. The White House announced that Presid

Highlights Mexico said it is willing to raise tariffs  on Chinese goods and buy more from the U.S. to avoid President Trump's 25% tariff, Bloomberg reported late Friday.   Canada and Mexico are feeding Trump evidence of their progress in curbing the flow of fentanyl opioids into the U.S. ahead of the midnight Monday deadline for 25% tariffs on their non-energy imports. Crude oil from Canada is facing a 10% tariff on its 4,000+ barrels per day to the U.S.      Friday’s financi

Highlights There were rains of 2.5 to 3.5 inches across a wide area of Argentina’s crop land yesterday and more rain is expected this Sunday through Wednesday next week. AgRural reported yesterday Brazil’s  soybean crop was 23% harvested as of last Thursday, an increase from 15% last week. They say the second crop corn is 36% planted. Ag Resource estimates that 24% of the soybeans have been harvested and about 30% of the second-crop safrinha corn was planted across Brazil as

Tidbits Crude oil futures gapped a dollar lower and traded as much as $4.00 lower last evening on the relatively “peaceful” Saturday attack by Israel on Iran. Last evening was the lowest trade in December crude futures since 1 October.   India’s crude oil demand will increase 4% during the final quarter of 2024 amid their festival season that also coincides with increased agricultural activity after the monsoon season, according to S&P Global Commodity Insights, as gasoline a

Tidbits Ukraine's President Zelensky made demands while speaking before the EU's European Council in Brussels. Zelensky said he wants to join NATO and, if Ukraine is not accepted, then he will have to resort to nuclear weapons. Zelensky sounds like he is getting more worried about Ukraine's situation.   The Biden Administration provided $425 million in aid to Ukraine earlier this week. From what we hear from people on the ground in Western North Carolina, that FEMA operation

Highlights After cutting interest rates 10 basis points Monday, yesterday China’s Central Bank presented the largest stimulus package since the pandemic to bolster economic growth in the country, lowering borrowing costs, cutting mortgage interest rates, smaller bank reserves, free money for certain industries and groups of people, etc. Their stocks and bonds ripped to their highest trade in more than two years, which contributed greatly to higher CBOT commodities yesterday m

Highlights The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) announced yesterday a tender to purchase 3.3 million barrels of crude oil for October delivery to replenish the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) at a price no higher than $79 per barrel. To date, the DOE has bought a total of 32.3 million barrels of oil at an average price of $76.98.   World crude oil demand is expected to grow less this year than earlier estimates and output should grow faster than previously thought, the U.S.

Highlights Analysts expect a military operation by the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) will likely maintain upward pressure on the crude oil market and natural gas to a lesser extent. The peak of hostilities will occur at the beginning of the driving season for Europe and the USA.   Israel announced it will launch an operation in Rafah, a city near the border with Egypt and the last refuge of Hamas among thousands of Palestinian refugees. The attack will begin before May 5th. The

Highlights European corn and wheat made new lows yesterday. Corn $4.29¼ per bushel and milling wheat $5.30 per bushel.   Yesterday afternoon, 247AG predicted Brazil will have a dry April; Eric Snodgrass said the same thing on 8 February. A dry April will be hard on the safrinha corn.         Eduardo Vanin with Agrinvest Marketing of Brazil shared these main points from a conference call discussion yesterday (19 Feb) with 78 Brazilian producers, agronomists, and input dealers

Tidbits CBOT markets will not open until Monday evening. NOAA released its monthly 3-month long-range outlook for the US, joining several private services predicting warmer temperatures for the summer and potential dryness for the Western Corn Belt.     Baker-Hughes reported there were 621 oil and gas drilling rigs in operation last week in the USA, 2 less than the previous week and 139 less than a year ago. Canada had 234 rigs drilling, 2 more than the previous week, but 14

Tidbits USDA will release its monthly S&D on Thursday, February 8th at 11 AM Central Time. There will be no US production changes, just demand changes. The world S&D will have production and demand changes. All eyes will be on the South American crops and China’s imports.   Jason Britt of Central States Commodities did the math to help us keep a “handle” on US exports: Corn export sales last week were 47.5 mil bu; 22.5 mil. bu. needed to meet USDA projection  Soybean sales 6

Highlights Late yesterday US time, the US launched airstrikes against Iran-backed militias in Syria and Iraq as the Mideast war continues to expand. The US struck 85 targets linked to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps’ Quds Force and affiliated groups. “Our response began today,” Biden said in a statement, “It will continue at times and places of our choosing.”   It was widely rumored at midday Friday that a substantial military strike would be launched within hours.

Tidbits The Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) has 12 members: the 7 members of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve, the President of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York; and four of the remaining eleven Reserve Bank presidents, who serve one-year terms on a rotating basis. The FOMC will begin a 2-day meeting today to decide if they should change the Fed’s discount rate, which determines the interest rate for the US economy. No interest rate change is expected th

Tidbits A Farm Futures survey of 825 growers resulted in them predicting US farmers will plant: 92.798 million acres of corn, 94.6 mil in 2023 84.953 million acres of soybeans, 83.6 mil. in 2023 47.994 million acres of wheat, 49.6 mil in 2023   Dr. Cordonnier left unchanged his corn production estimate for Brazil at 115 mil mts. He also kept his Argentine corn estimate steady at 56 mil mts, with 23% of the crop pollinating; 46% rated good or excellent.   The good doctor left

Highlights OPEC has postponed their Sunday meeting to consider production cuts. That news caused crude oil to sell-off over $3 yesterday before recovering nicely by the close, but weaker over night.   Edurado Vanin, an export grain and soybean manager in Brazil reported yesterday China continues to buy US soybeans. He said this week China is looking to buy 8-10 shiploads (~400,000 to 500,000 mts) of US soybeans. Yesterday, brokers in various Asian countries were asking about

Highlights OPEC members, Nigeria and Iran, have been cheating on their crude oil quota the past two months while other OPEC members did maintain reduced production. OPEC produced more crude in August than they did in July, but OPEC leaders (aka Saudi Arabia) swept that under the rug to keep prices on an upward trajectory. However, after the same two “villians” over produced again in September, the Saudis “blew the whistle” yesterday and crude oil prices slumped $2 and settled

Highlights Pro Farmer Crop Tour Results Thursday: Drought Monitor: % change of crop area in drought Corn +1, Cotton +8, Sorghum +1, Soybean 0, Spring Wheat 0, Winter Wheat +1

Written yesterday morning: "Roger, I am in one of the dry pockets of NE Iowa (about 45 minutes north of Waterloo). I have had a little over an inch of rain since the 4th of July. Yesterday, when I was taking a load of beans to Shell Rock, I saw 3 choppers taking corn. I don't ever remember seeing choppers rolling by Aug 17. I walked some fields last night and pollination was good but seed depth is lacking. Several farmers I talked to have speculated we will have lower test we