EU Grains Close

Posted by Nogger - a legend in his own mind at 19:22 | Categorized as

07/04/11 -- EU grains closed with May London wheat down GBP0.50/tonne to GBP205.50/tonne and with new crop Nov falling GBP2.10 to GBP169.25/tonne. May Paris wheat fell EUR0.75/tonne to EUR249.75/tonne and Nov was down EUR1.25/tonne at EUR218.50/tonne.

As strong earthquake and subsequent tsunami warning for NE Japan got the markets rattled late afternoon ahead of tomorrow's USDA reports. That was probably enough of a jolt to encourage some spec money to be taken off the table overnight.

London wheat fell GBP17.50/tonne and Paris wheat EUR31.00/tonne in three trading session immediately after the last major quake hit the region on March 11th.

Northern Europe has had a few showers over the past couple of days, but more is needed to restore depleted subsoil moisture, with very warm temperatures still in the forecast, according to Martell Crop Projections.

Tomorrow's USDA reports are likely to be of more importance for corn and soybeans than wheat, although the corn numbers in particular will also have a bearing on wheat demand.

US 2010/11 ending stocks for wheat are seen increasing from 843m bu (22.9 MMT) last month to 857m bu (23.3 MMT) this time round, whilst global ending stocks are forecast more or less unchanged at 182 MMT.

Corn stocks however are forecast to decline, from 17.1 MMT in the US to 14.9 MMT and globally from 123 MMT to 121 MMT.

Elsewhere, wheat continues to pour out of Australia with shipments from the east coast hitting record highs in February. The Australia & New Zealand Bank thinks that it's current estimate for wheat exports of 16 MMT in the current marketing year may be on the low side, even though that figure is 2.5 MMT higher than the USDA's March estimate.

Brussels issued 286,000 MT of soft wheat export licences for the week to Apr 4th, bringing the current marketing year to date total to 15.7 MMT, 2 MMT higher than at this time last year.