Wheat recovers from one-month low; soybeans gain for second session

SINGAPORE: Chicago wheat rose on Tuesday, as the market recovered from its lowest levels since early May on bargain-buying, although pressure from the expanding northern hemisphere harvest and Turkiye import ban limited the upside in prices.

Paris wheat falls on worry about Turkey’s import ban

Soybeans rose for a second session, while corn edged lower.

Fundamentals

• The most-active wheat contract on the Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT) was up 0.2% at $6.08-3/4 a bushel, as of 0021 GMT, having dropped to its weakest since May 3 at $6.05-1/2 a bushel earlier on Tuesday.

• Soybeans added 0.2% to $11.90 a bushel and corn lost 0.1% to $4.51-1/4 a bushel.

• Rapidly expanding wheat harvest in the United States and other exporters is weighing on prices.

• In Russia, the world’s No. 1 wheat exporter, export prices snapped a sixth weekly gain to retreat last week following Turkey’s decision to curb imports until mid-October. Turkey is the world’s fifth-largest wheat importer, buying mostly from Russia.

• Forecasts called for welcome rains this week across portions of the Black Sea grain belt that should improve soil moisture, space technology company Maxar said in a daily weather note.

• However, the US Department of Agriculture lowered its weekly US crop condition ratings for both winter and spring wheat, while analysts on average had expected no change.

• The winter wheat harvest was 12% complete, the government said, ahead of the five-year average of 6%, but on the low-end of analyst estimates.

• The USDA’s corn and soybean crop ratings were in line with trade expectations. The agency, after the CBOT closed on Monday, rated 74% of the US corn crop in “good-to-excellent” condition, down a point from last week, and soybeans were rated 72% “good-to-excellent” in the USDA’s first ratings of 2024 for the oilseed.

• Brazil’s second corn harvest for the 2024 cycle had reached 10.4% of the planted area in the key center-south region, as of last Thursday, agribusiness consultancy AgRural said on Monday, its fastest pace in more than a decade.

• The figure is the highest for the period since at least 2013, when AgRural started its weekly surveys on Brazil’s second corn crop, which represents about 75% of the national production each year.

• Commodity funds were net sellers of CBOT wheat and soyoil futures contracts on Monday and net buyers of CBOT corn, soymeal and soybean futures, traders said.