EU Wheat Close

Posted by Nogger - a legend in his own mind at 19:15 | Categorized as

28/02/11 -- EU wheat closed lower with Mar London wheat down GBP0.50 to GBP201.00/tonne and new crop Nov GBP2.25 easier at GBP164.50/tonne. Mar Paris wheat fell EUR1.50 to EUR257.50/tonne, with Nov EUR3.25 lower at EUR219.25/tonne.

Weekend rains/snow in China reduced the area there affected by drought to 2.52 million hectares, according to the Ministry of Water Resources, that's two thirds down on where we were at the height of the problem.

Saudi Arabia bought 275,000 MT of wheat over the weekend, one cargo coming from a surprise source - Brazil. The remainder was made up of US wheat.

EU soft wheat export licences were 439,000 MT last week, but we need to keep up that pace for the remainder of the marketing year to hit the USDA's target of 21.5 MMT in the 2010/11 season. We've only managed to better that total once so far this year.

Crude oil was flat after last week's excitement, with few changes to the Middle Eastern situation over the weekend.

The pound rose against both the dollar and the euro, depressing UK values.

Weaker US markets following Friday's strong gains were probably influenced by profit-taking and poor weekly US export inspections of less than 20 million bushels compared to 31.2 million last week.