Spot basis bids for corn and soyabeans held steady around the interior US Midwest on Monday but fell at river terminals, grain dealers said. Farmer selling was slow on Monday. Many growers were planning on storing as much corn as they can in hopes that prices will rise in the coming months, a dealer in northern Ohio said.
Expectations for a bumper crop of corn this year have left cash prices below farmers' target price. Soyabean prices also were below farmers' targets. Many growers were looking for a rally to $8 per bushel for soyabeans before they booked any new sales.
The US Agriculture Department said on Monday that the corn crop was rated 59 percent good to excellent in the week ended August 26, up from 58 percent last week. Traders had been expecting corn ratings to hold steady during the past week.
Soyabeans were rated 55 percent good to excellent, up from 54 percent good to excellent a week ago and beating market forecasts for a 2 to 4 percentage-point drop in good to excellent ratings.
Shipping costs were steady to firm on Midwest rivers as rising water levels made transport more difficult. The start of the southern corn harvest was leading to limited availability of empty barges. Barge traffic was stopped on the upper Illinois River due to high water, although there was no official closing of the waterway. No barges were moving on the river for about 60 miles south of Chicago, a barge operator said.
Barges traded for 700 percent of tariff on the Illinois River on Monday, in line with Friday's trades. On the lower Ohio River, barges traded in a range from 800 percent to 825 percent of tariff, up from a range of 725 percent to 775 percent of tariff on Friday.
On the Mississippi River at St. Louis, barges traded for 1000 percent of tariff, up 150 percentage points from Friday's level. At the Chicago Board of Trade, the September soyabean futures contract closed 7-1/2 cents higher at $8.56-1/2 per bushel on technical buying and fears of a drop in crop condition ratings. The November contract rose 7-3/4 cents to $8.72-3/4 per bushel.
CBOT September corn futures fell 5-3/4 cents to $3.35-3/4 per bushel on a forecast for a bigger-than-expected US corn crop. September wheat futures fell 3-1/2 cents to close at $7.22-1/4 per bushel, weighed down by weakness in corn.
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