FOB Gulf corn and soyabean mostly steady

US FOB Gulf corn and soyabean basis offers were mostly steady on Tuesday, with barge freight edging higher on expected grain movement from mid-August. Dealers said hard and soft red winter wheat basis values were steady, with farmer selling keeping a lid on prices.
Dealers said SRW wheat with vomitoxin levels of 2 parts per million or less was fetching a premium of 5 cents a bushel.
Vomitoxin, the potentially harmful residue of a plant fungus, has been showing up in parts of the Midwest.
Barge freight on rivers transporting grains to export terminals at the US Gulf continued to climb as likely record harvests of corn and soyabeans drew closer, dealers said.
There was also spot demand as old crop supplies began moving. Barge freight for this week on the Mississippi River at St. Louis traded 10 basis points higher at 160 percent of tariff. For August, offers rose 5 points to 205 percent.
On the Lower Ohio, offers for this week rose 5 points to 160. On the Illinois River, offers for this week were up 5 points, and up 10 points for August, freight dealers said.
There are expectations for the soyabean harvest in the Mississippi Delta to begin in the next week to 10 days, which would help to ease the present tightness in supplies.
"Delta beans are going to be moving soon," one dealer said of the higher barge freight.
There was a second day of talk of Chinese interest in US soyabeans, but it could not be independently confirmed.
The talk had Chinese crushers seeking September/October shipment soyabeans from the Pacific Northwest, dealers said.
Chinese crushers have been absent from the South American market the past two months as they struggled to pay for their purchases amid a credit crunch.
Strong processor and exporter demand lifted soyabean basis values in the CIF barge market, sending July offers soaring 40 cents to 100 cents a bushel premium the CBOT August.
A dealer said an exporter bought two barges of July soyabeans at 65 cents a bushel premium the CBOT August.
Corn basis offers were steady, underpinned by slow farmer selling and the rising barge freight, dealers said.
There are also expectations that export demand will pick up with the recent slump in CBOT corn futures. But ocean freight has been edging up after weakening last week.
Rates from the US Gulf to Japan were quoted at $52 to $53 per tonne, up from $48 a week ago.