EU Grains Little Changed, Key Support Holds In Wheat

Posted by Nogger - a legend in his own mind at 07:55 | Categorized as

21/08/14 -- EU grains closed mixed, but mostly a little higher, with London wheat again testing but holding above the GBP120/tonne level, although the HGCA said that a close below that level was probably likely in the coming days.

The day ended with Nov 14 London wheat up GBP0.15/tonne at GBP120.85/tonne, Nov 14 Paris wheat was EUR0.25/tonne firmer at EUR171.50/tonne, Nov 14 Paris corn was up EUR0.50/tonne EUR153.25/tonne and Nov 14 Paris rapeseed was EUR2.75/tonne higher at EUR323.50/tonne.

The HGCA said that UK wheat yields this year were "we'll above average" at 8.2-8.5 MT/ha, up around 11-15% from 7.4 MT/ha a year ago and also well above the USDA's current forecast of 7.8 MT/ha and the 10-year average of 7.7 MT/ha.

They said that this year's wheat harvest was now 55% done on a national level, with protein levels averaging around 12% in the milling wheats, where hagbergs are at 291.

They said that the winter barley harvest was finished, pegging yields at 7.2-7.4 MT/ha versus the 10-year average of 6.4 MT/ha. Spring barley harvesting was 40% complete, with yields here also demonstrating a significant improvement on the 10-year average of 5.4 MT/ha at 5.9-6.1 MT/ha.

The winter OSR harvest is complete with yields of 3.4-3.6 MT/ha a bit closer to the 'norm' of 3.3 MT/ha, they added.

Strategie Grains were said to have revised up their forecast for the proportion of this year's French wheat crop that is milling standard from 62% to 64%, although that's still a sharp fall compared to 88% last year.

Reuters reported that France had unloaded a small coaster of around 3,000 MT of UK milling wheat in Dunkirk this week, and was currently discharging a larger 27,500 MT consignment of Lithuanian milling wheat in Rouen. A second shipment of 4,400 MT of UK milling wheat is expected to arrive in the latter port today.

French and Ukraine origin feed wheat is still undercutting UK wheat on the international market however.

The HGCA website yesterday carried an interesting article that's worth a read, suggesting that there may be an opportunity to minimise losses for UK growers in selling the long Nov 15 future, to take advantage of the unusually large premium that it currently offers over the nearby Nov 14 contract.

Sweden said that they'd harvest 2.7 MMT of wheat this year, more than double the 1.3 MMT produced in 2013.

Belarus said that they'd harvested a record 9.2 MMT of grains this year, including around 3 MMT of wheat and 2 MMT of barley. Quality this year was said to be 'very high' by the Ag Ministry.

Romania said that it had harvested a record 1.1 MMT of rapeseed this year, up sharply from less than 650 TMT in 2013, due to increased plantings and better yields.

The Spanish Ag Ministry said that they'd imported 16% less wheat (3.37 MMT) in 2013/14, and around the same volume of corn (5.84 MMT).

Ukraine said it had exported 3.7 MMT of grains so far this season, including over 1.8 MMT of wheat and more than 1.4 MMT of barley.

Russian 12.5% milling wheat trades around $240/tonne FOB on the spot market, circa GBP144.50/tonne.