SINGAPORE: Chicago soybean futures rose on Wednesday, supported by traders unwinding short positions, although a rapidly advancing harvest bumper crop in Brazil curbed gains.
Wheat fell for the first time in three sessions, while corn lost ground. The most-active soybean contract on the Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT) added 0.1% to $11.87 a bushel, as of 0323 GMT. Wheat fell 0.4% to $5.50-1/2 a bushel and corn slid 0.2% to $4.38-1/2 a bushel.
Short covering is supporting the soybean market ahead of the US March 28 Prospective Plantings and quarterly stocks reports, which have a history of jolting markets. Overall, strong crop prospects in South America are limiting the upside potential in prices. Brazil’s soybean harvest reached 63% of the planted area as of last Thursday, agribusiness consultancy AgRural said on Monday, up 8 percentage points from the previous week and just ahead of the 62% a year earlier. Russian attacks on Ukrainian agriculture infrastructure over the weekend revived worries about disruption to massive grain exports through the Black Sea.
Huge supplies of cheap Russian wheat continue to hang over the market. Commodity funds were net buyers of CBOT wheat, corn and soymeal futures contracts on Tuesday and net sellers of soybean and soyoil futures, traders said.
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