News Snippets

Posted by Nogger - a legend in his own mind at 10:58 | Categorized as

12/01/12 -- A record 8.25 MMT carry-in left over from last season, plus record output this year (estimated at 28.3 MMT by ABARES) leaves Australia awash with wheat. November wheat exports were up 50% from Ocober to 1.75 MMT and almost double the volume shipped in the same month in 2010.

The euro is up for once this morning after promising bond auctions from Spain and Italy. Spain raised EUR10.4 billion - double the targeted amount, with total bids amounting to EUR18.7 billion. Meanwhile 10-year Italian yields came in at 6.65%, down 33 pips and 1-year bills were sold at 2.735% versus 5.952% a month ago.

The United Nation's Food and Agriculture Organization says that world food prices fell 2.4% in December. That will have them dancing in the Cairo bread queues I'm sure. They'd better make the most of it judging by recent fund activity. Is anyone else getting deja vu here?

FranceAgriMer have slightly increased their estimate for the 2011/12 soft wheat harvest to 33.97 MMT. Domestic consumption is seen unchanged from last month at 15.34 MMT. Exports within the EU are also raised a tad to 6.62 MMT and exports to non-EU destinations upped from 8.6 MMT to 8.7 MMT, making total shipments this season to 15.44 MMT, 21.7% down on last year's 19.7 MMT. Ending stocks are place at 2.29 MMT versus 2.93 MMT in 2010/11.

The Bank of England have surprised nobody by leaving UK interest rates on hold at 0.5% and kept a lid on QE too.

Tesco have announced that they had a disappointing Christmas, their shares plunged 14% this morning on the news. Blimey, how much stuff did AWT nick I wonder?

The overnight grains are all a bit higher, with wheat up 4-5 cents, corn up 6-7 cents and soybeans 7-8 cents higher in anticipation of a slightly bullish USDA report. Will they deliver?