Morning Snippets

Posted by Nogger - a legend in his own mind at 11:07 | Categorized as

21/05/13 -- The overnight market sees beans unchanged on front month July, but everything else is red, with new crop Nov 13 down 6 1/2 cents. It's old crop corn that is taking the biggest pasting, down 14 1/2 cents nearby, with wheat also showing around 10-11 cents lower.

New crop Dec 13 corn is down 8 1/4 cents, another decline of a similar magnitude would see it trade with a 4 in front of it.

The USDA numbers suggest that farmers planted 42 million acres of corn in the week through to Sunday night, a record area in a week.

US winter wheat crop conditions fell again, and spring wheat planting remains delayed, but the market is instead choosing to look at the global supply picture for wheat.

Whilst there are still some concerns over Ukraine and Russian grain production this year, output estimates are still well ahead of year ago levels. IKAR yesterday increased their Russian wheat production forecast to 53.8 MMT versus a previous estimate of 52.5 MMT and 37.7 MMT in 2012.

A report on Reuters today says that Paraguay's 2012/13 soybean crop may have come in at a record 9 MMT this year, versus the government's forecast of 8.4 MMT and the USDA's 8.35 MMT, according to the CAPECO export chamber. Plantings were up 5-6% for this season, and yields have beat the previous record of 2.7 MT/ha, coming in at 3.0 MT/ha, they say.

The FT carry a report today saying that Argentine farmers have slowly begun selling soybeans "to cover their commitments". Agritrend say sales are now around 1.8-2.0 MMT/month and could rise to 3.5-4.0 MT/month in the months ahead.

Ag Processing Inc, said to be the largest farmer‐owned soybean processor in the world, have said that they will be permanently closing their Nebraska ethanol plant which had been idled since February.

Anacer said Italy Jan-Feb soft wheat imports fell by almost a third to 465,888 MT this year versus 690,797 MT a year previously. Corn imports in the same period rose to 671,063 MT from 388,807 MT a year ago.

Old crop Jul 13 London wheat opened GBP1.75/tonne lower at GBP177.00/tonne this morning - the contract's lowest level in 11 months.