SINGAPORE: Chicago corn futures slid more than 1% on Tuesday, as investors took a breather after prices hit a more than two-month high in the previous session on support from the deteriorating condition of the US crop.
Wheat dipped but traded close to a seven-week top marked in the previous session, while soybeans slid for a second straight session.
“The market is still absorbing the likely lower US corn crop after last week’s Pro Farmer crop tour revealed a much lower yield estimate,” said Tobin Gorey, director of agricultural strategy at the Commonwealth Bank of Australia.
“The USDA (US Department of Agriculture) published their weekly crop survey after the close of trading (on Monday). The survey showed another one percentage point fall in the good or excellent proportion to 54%. The fall, while small, will add weight to the bad news trend and likely support prices.”
The most-active corn contract on the Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT) slid 1.2% to $6.74-1/2 a bushel, as of 246 GMT. The market climbed to its highest since late June on Monday.
Wheat fell 1% to $8.34-1/2 a bushel and soybeans lost 1.3% to $14.19-3/4 a bushel.
Corn jumps to 2-month high as dryness curbs US yields
The USDA, in a weekly report, rated 54% of the nation’s corn crop in good-excellent condition, down from 55% a week earlier and in line with analysts’ estimates.
Ratings for the soybean crop were unchanged at 57% good-excellent, above expectations for 56%.
Advisory service Pro Farmer on Friday estimated the US corn harvest at 13.759 billion bushels, the smallest since 2019 and below the USDA forecast of 14.359 billion bushels. Scouts on a Pro Farmer tour last week checked crops in hundreds of Midwestern fields.
For soybeans, Pro Farmer predicted a crop of 4.535 billion bushels, slightly above the USDA forecast of 4.531 billion bushels.
Gains in corn futures reflected market efforts to entice farmers in South America to plant more acres of the grain at a time of supply concerns, analysts said.
Ukraine’s agricultural exports could rise to 6 million-6.5 million tonnes in October, double the volume seen in July, as its sea ports gradually reopen, the country’s agriculture minister said on Monday.
The Russia-focused Sovecon consultancy said it had raised its forecast for Russia’s wheat exports in the 2022/23 marketing season which started on July 1 by 200,000 tonnes to 43.1 million tonnes.
Canadian farmers will harvest more wheat than expected, and the biggest canola crop in three years, a report featuring the government’s first official harvest estimates showed.
Statistics Canada estimated all-wheat production at 34.6 million tonnes, 55% more than last year, and exceeding the industry’s average estimate of 34 million.
China’s agriculture minister expressed concern for the country’s autumn grain production, according to a ministry statement on Monday, and said high temperatures and drought have hit rice production in the eastern Jiangsu and Anhui provinces.
Commodity funds were net buyers of CBOT corn and wheat futures contracts on Monday and sellers of soybean and soyoil futures, traders said. Funds were seen as net even in soymeal futures, traders said.
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