Chicago Market Closing Comments - Friday Night
12/06/15 -- Soycomplex: Beans closed little changed on the day and for the week. The trade will be pondering how soybean plantings have gone this week. The USDA will tell us on Monday. There was still 21% of the crop left to plant as of last Sunday night. Missouri was only 30% done versus 69% normally, and Kansas was 31% sown compared to 76% on average. Also due on Monday is the NOPA crush report for May, with a possible record large crush for the month of 147.3 million bushels expected. Trade estimates range from 143.5 million to 150.7 million bushels. Informa's acreage numbers, which were due today, have apparently been delayed until early next week. Their previous soybean area estimate was 87.185 million acres compared with the USDA's March planting intentions of 84.635 million. The latter number means that there were over 17.75 million acres of soybeans left unplanted as of last Sunday night. If Informa are right it's 18.3 million acres. The latest commitment of traders report shows that managed money reduced their net short position in beans by almost 12k contracts for the week through to Tuesday night. Jul 15 Soybeans closed at $9.40, unchanged; Nov 15 Soybeans closed at $9.04 1/4, down 4 1/2 cents; Jul 15 Soybean Meal closed at $317.40, up $4.00; Jul 15 Soybean Oil closed at 33.14, down 15 points. For the week, front month beans were 2 1/2 cents higher, meal gained $12.50 and oil shed 164 points.
Corn: The corn market closed around 3-5 cents lower on the day and 7-8 cents easier for the week. There's another very wet forecast for the week ahead for the the southern Great Plains and Midwest. For the time being the trade is reading that as being bearish for corn using the old "rain makes grain" adage. This is seen as being typical of the emerging El Nino. There's now an 85 percent chance El Nino will persist into January and beyond, according to the US Climate Prediction Centre. In addition to that "much of today’s weakness stemmed from the global front with China indicating they are a preparing to lower their subsidies on domestically raised corn while delaying or cancelling US DDG cargo’s. Rumours of cancellation has put cash values of DDG’s on the defence with prices shedding $15/tonne over the week," noted Benson Quinn. Agritel raised their forecast for the 2015 Russian corn crop from 11.7 MMT to a record 12.1 MMT. Planting of that is 96.4% complete, according to the Russian Ag Ministry. Estimates for Brazil's safrinha corn crop are increasing due to good rains. The latest commitment of traders report sows fund money reducing their net short position in corn by 44,268 contracts for the week through to Tuesday night. Jul 15 Corn closed at $3.53, down 3 1/2 cents; Dec 15 Corn closed at $3.69 1/2, down 4 3/4 cents. For the week, corn was down 7 1/2 cents on the front month.
Wheat: The wheat market closed mixed on the day, but lower for the week. The heavy rain forecast for the Plains is seen as further hampering early harvesting attempts, and possibly causing some quality issues as well as perhaps yield losses. "The rainfall forecast continues very wet in the upcoming week. Heaviest rain is predicted in the southern Great Plains, 4-7 inches in west Texas and Oklahoma," said Martell Crop Projections. Plains Grains estimate that the Texas wheat crop is 23% harvested, Oklahoma is 17% harvested, and the Kansas wheat crop is 1% cut. The USDA will update us with their figures on Monday. Egypt's GASC were back in the market, booking two cargoes of Romanian and one of Russian wheat today. The fact that this business is being done at huge discounts to US offers remains a bearish consideration for US wheat. Tunisia is tendering for 84,000 MT of soft wheat, 59,000 MT of durum wheat, and 75,000 MT of of feed barley, all of optional origins for Jul-Sep shipment. Tonight's commitment of traders report shows fund money cutting their Chicago wheat short by more than half for the week through to Tuesday night. Jul 15 CBOT Wheat closed at $5.03 3/4, down 1/2 cent; Jul 15 KCBT Wheat closed at $5.26, up 2 3/4 cents; Jul 15 MGEX Wheat closed at $5.61 1/4, down 1 1/2 cents. For the week that puts Chicago wheat 13 1/4 cents lower, with the Kansas market down 9 1/4 cents and Minneapolis 10 1/4 cents weaker.
