EU Wheat Carnage

Posted by Nogger - a legend in his own mind at 19:46 | Categorized as

22/06/11 -- EU grains finished in a bit of a bloodbath with July London wheat down GBP6.00 to GBP166.00/tonne and with new crop Nov falling an "Ayrton" - down GBP10.00/tonne to GBP164.00/tonne. Nov Paris wheat slumped EUR15.75/tonne lower at EUR196.75/tonne whilst May12 fell EUR14.75/tonne to EUR202.25/tonne.

What a disastrous close for wheat. Even worse news came from Paris malting barley which finished with losses of EUR20.50 to EUR23.00/tonne. I'm looking forward to reading this market report myself as even I haven't got a clue as to what it is going to say at this stage yet!

July London wheat managed to set the lowest close for a front month since mid-November 2010, comfortably eclipsing even the mid-March slump that occurred in the first few days after the Japanese earthquake and subsequent tsunami.

Paris wheat inflicted even worse technical damage upon itself. Front month August collapsed EUR15.75/tonne to EUR194.50/tonne. Not only did that crash through the psychologically important EUR200.00/tonne mark, it was the lowest close for a front month since July 2010, when prices were on the up following the realisation that Russia's crop was toast.

Another dose of widespread rains all over the UK, France and Germany over the weekend, and the prospect of more to come has got the market thinking that things are nowhere near as bad as was feared a month ago.

The over-riding factor though has to be spec money exiting the arena once again. Despite the Greek government getting a marginal thumbs up last night, there is a growing feeling that they will not find the required austerity measures anything like as easy to push through next week.

That could lead us to Financial Armageddon II. Do you remember the first one? It came out in 2008. Directed by Quentin Tarantino I think it was, except this one is in 3D.

Greece and Lehman Brothers, you never see them in the same room at the same time do you...