Nogger's Blog

31/10/16 -- Soycomplex: Soybeans closed with little change. Weekly export inspections of 2.867 MMT were impressive. Adding to the "strong demand" theme was the announcement of a sale of 246,000 MT of US beans to China under the daily reporting system. After the close the USDA reported this year's US soybean harvest at 87% complete, up 11 points on a week ago and 2 points ahead of the 5-year average. The US Census crush report comes out tomorrow. Trade ideas for that are around 138 million bushels. IMEA said that soybean planting in Brazil's Mato Grosso is 67% done, up an impressive 25 points in a week as growers go flat out to get the crop in. The downside of this is that harvesting will also likely be concentrated into a smaller window. Nov 16 Soybeans settled at $10.02 1/4, up 1 cent; Jan 17 Soybeans settled at $10.11 3/4, down 1/4 cent; Dec Soybean Meal settled at $316.10, down $1.40; Dec 16 Soybean Oil settled at 35.17, down 24 points.

Corn: The corn market closed with minor losses. Weekly export inspections of 791,896 MT were up 45% from last week and up 63% versus the same week a year ago. Loadings to date are now 3.9 MMT ahead of a year ago. The USDA announced the sale of 100,973 MT of corn and 111,000 MT of grain sorghum for delivery to unknown destinations during the 2016/17 marketing year. After the close they placed the 2016 US corn harvest at 75% complete versus 61% a week ago and exactly in line with the 5-year average. Ukraine's corn exports are picking up, with the country's seaports shipping out 300,800 MT of corn last week. Russia's seaports exported 99,500 MT of corn last week. The Russian Ag Ministry said that their 2016 corn harvest was 59.9% complete at 9.7 MMT. Private Israeli buyers are shopping for 95,000 MT of optional origin corn. South American weather forecasts place ample rains in most of the corn growing areas over the next 10 days, said FCStone. Dec 16 Corn settled at $3.54 3/4, down 1/4 cent; Mar 17 Corn settled at $3.62 3/4, down 1/2 cent.

Wheat: The wheat market closed with fair gains, led by Chicago. Weekly export inspections of 325 TMT "were routine, but better than previous weeks," said Benson Quinn. Concerns over the last of the Canadian crop are supportive, with Saskatchewan's spring wheat harvest still only 81% complete. Dryness in US winter wheat areas keeps getting flagged up too. The USDA has that crop now at 86% planted versus 88% on average. Emergence is 70% versus 69% on average. Crop conditions good to excellent this week were down 1 point to 58%, but still a lot better than 49% a year ago. The Canadian Wheat Board said that the country's wheat exports so far this season are 23% down on a year ago at 3.2 MMT. Despite being 95% of the way towards a post Soviet era record grain harvest, Russia's exports so far this season are 6% lower than a year ago at 12.5 MMT. Russian analysts IKAR today lowered their forecast for Russia's full season grain exports by 600,000 MT to 39.4 MMT. Dec 16 CBOT Wheat settled at $4.16 1/4, up 7 3/4 cents; Dec 16 KCBT Wheat settled at $4.14 3/4, up 3 1/2 cents; Dec 16 MGEX Wheat settled at $5.26 3/4, up 2 1/4 cents.