Grain Marketing Education, News & Strategies

Highlights Trump’s newly appointed counterterrorism adviser, Sebastian Gorka, says Trump plans to end the Ukraine war by threatening to flood Ukraine with military aid, making current U.S. support look like “peanuts.” Andrey Sizov, the guru of Black Sea wheat market, reported yesterday afternoon that Russia, the world’s biggest wheat exporter, is gradually running out of inventory. "Russian total on-farm stocks: Lowest in three years, but still above average. Southern regi

Highlights Yesterday morning, the USDA announced the sale of 124,000 mts of corn to unknown. Dr. Michael Cordonnier left his South American corn and soybean crop estimates unchanged from last month (in million mts): Corn: Brazil 125 (USDA 127), Argentina 48 (USDA 51) Soybeans: Brazil 165 (USDA 169), Argentina 57 (USDA 51) Egypt purchased 290,000 mts of wheat this week: 120,000 mts Romania 120,000 mts Ukraine 50,000 mts Bulgaria Chinese manufacturing purchasing manage

Highlights Wayne Bacon of Hammersmith Reports has been involved in the international grain trade for more than 60 years. His comment this week on corn: "Corn had a good week for export with large sales to Mexico and a new shipment loading to Tunisia in NOLA. I have not seen US corn sold to Tunisia in quite a while. The US Grains Council office in Tunis says that more US corn business is expected for Tunisia." Tunisia is in North Africa, a hop, skip, and a jump from the Blac

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

Q&A: Trading Thursday, 24 October 2024: "Good evening, I have a few questions. Are there any calls for soybeans that look as good as the March call for corn? Also, I assume you can sell these calls any time before the expiration date? Do you guys recommend any type of app that you can buy/sell futures, calls, puts, etc? I would not mind using a broker, but we are not currently set up with a broker and I am not sure how to locate a trustworthy one. So, I thought mayb

Tidbits Yesterday’s weakness for corn and beans was a result of speculative profit-taking after four days of gains earlier in the week, options expiration, and merchandiser pre-hedging in the corn. The weakness in wheat made no sense at all. Yesterday morning, USDA announced the sale of: 116,000 mts of old crop soybeans to China and 136,000 mts of old crop corn to Mexico Since Monday, the US reported “flash” sales like the above notice totaled 1.347 million mts of beans (

Tidbits Asia markets opened today with an increasingly bullish global backdrop fueled by continued strength in U.S. stocks, but with local sentiment more circumspect due to the uncertainty surrounding China's deep-rooted economic problems, but China continues to address those problems. The People's Bank of China is expected to cut its loan prime rates today as Beijing's latest move in a series of monetary, fiscal, and liquidity support measures to shore up the imploding pro

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 Yesterday morning, USDA announced the sale of: 1,043,940 mts of old crop corn to Mexico 579,120 mts of new crop corn to Mexico 332,000 mts of old crop corn to unknown 175,000 mts of old crop soybeans to unknown November soybean futures gained 5½¢ on the January beans the past 8 trading sessions. Benson Quinn Commodities, which is owned by ADM, say crushers only have enough beans to keep operating for two weeks. Farmers are not selling beans with the 90¢ drop in f

Q&A: ENSO Eugene asked: "Last Tuesday, you guys reported this ENSO chart: Your comment says that 60 days below the -0.5 threshold forms the La Nina. Water temperature has been below the line at least since early July. However, NOAA says "La Niña is favored to emerge in September-November (60% chance)". https://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/enso_advisory/ensodisc.shtml So, why is it not a La Nina event already but a chance for it?" Roger’s reply:

Highlights Several of our Eastern Corn Belt clients informed us yesterday afternoon and evening that the wind on the wet corn stalks really knocked a lot of corn down late Friday to Saturday morning. Bob told us the Case IH dealer in Urbana of Champaign County, Ohio sold two corn reels yesterday morning. Soybean yields from about a dozen farms in northeast Illinois range from 25.4 to 65.1. Three in the 20's, one 39 bu, three in the 40's, one 53.7, and two in the 60's. T

Highlights The International Grains Council (IGC) predicts record large global grain production and record large global consumption for the 2024-25 marketing year. More importantly, world carryovers (aka ending stocks) are projected at a 10-year low. IGC’s report on Wednesday listed total grains (wheat and coarse grains) output at 2.315 billion mts and consumption at 2.325 billion mts with the carryover down to 581 million mts, the lowest since 2014-15. The records are fo

Question from a client, received 8:01 PM Thursday 1 August 2024: "Hey Roger, We just got a quick localized, well-needed 1 inch of rain so things are much better than yesterday's hot dry windy conditions. I am not a conspiracy theorist by no means with what is and has been happening in Europe with the gov't trying to regulate and put farmers out of business and what we have seen in the grain market and what you wrote today, "Altogether, yesterday, crude oil was sharply hig

Highlights StoneX predicts the US corn will yield 182.3 (USDA 181) and beans 52.6 (USDA 52). The US soybean crush in June was 183.7 million bushels, 1.1 million less than the market expected, but 8.7 million bushels more than a year ago. The corn crush was 495 million bushels with 442 million bushels for ethanol, up slightly from a year ago. Canola crush was 198,005 tons, well above the 158,305 tons crushed a year ago. Cottonseed once refined oil production was 30.1 mi

Highlights Fears that China’s economy will falter and substantially reduce demand for imports of everything has been a consistent bearish theme since 2020 and the intensity increased in 2024. The real estate developers’ crushing debt has been milked for all its worth by everyone who wants grain prices to go down. One of the two biggest developers, Evergrande, filed bankruptcy in 2023 in the USA and a Hong Kong court ordered Evergrande assets to be liquidated 6 months ago. T

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 Yesterday morning, the USDA announced the sale of 510,000 mts of new crop soybeans and 150,000 mts of new crop soybean cake and meal to the unknown. The Northern Plains over the next 2-3 weeks are going from too wet and too cool to maybe too hot and too dry. NOAA weather outlook for August has higher than normal temperature and normal precipitation expected, it is about the same idea for Aug-Sept-Oct period:

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

Q&A Received 3 PM Central Wednesday 13 June 2024: If we are “lucky” enough to have old crop corn and beans, should we roll to August now? Beans inverted, so still roll? Instead of waiting till the end of month or sell and go futures or options. Any news on China weather? Thanks Russ Good morning, Russ, most merchandisers require July basis contracts to be cashed out or rolled before the close of business on June 27th, the last trading day before first notice day. A lot can