SINGAPORE: Chicago wheat inched up Monday, with bargain buying supporting prices, after the market suffered in its biggest daily loss in more than three months in the previous session on expectations of improved weather in key growing areas.
Soybeans ticked higher, recouping some of Friday’s losses while corn firmed. “It is combination of two factors which pressured prices.
There is improved weather in Russia and US for wheat planting and demand is pretty subdued,“ a Singapore-based grains trader said.
“Buyers are not active in the market as they are looking at a big crop from Australia despite some damage from dryness.”
The most-active wheat contract on the Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT) rose 0.2% to $5.74 a bushel, as of 0406 GMT, having lost on Friday 2.8%, the biggest one day drop since mid-July.
Soybeans added 0.5% to $9.75 a bushel, having dropped 2% on Friday and corn gained 0.1% at $4.05-1/4 a bushel.
The return of rain to parched wheat areas in southern Russia and the central United States have eased worries about dryness hampering plantings for the 2025 crop, though drought was still seen as a risk.
Persistent dry weather in southern regions of Australia that suffered frost damage last month is depressing wheat yields but the country could still produce an above-average harvest, analysts said on Friday.
Dry weather and Russian export concerns lift wheat
A shift in Russian export policies fuelled concerns that US commercial grain companies will be left holding large supplies of wheat, weighing on prices.
Russian grain exporters will sell directly to sovereign buyers, while non-Russian winners of international tenders will receive Russian grain only if they have long-term off-take agreements with Russian firms, the Grain Exporters Union said on Friday.
France’s maize harvest fell further behind its usual pace last week, data showed on Friday, as heavy rain continued to hamper field work in the European Union’s biggest grain producer.
Large speculators increased their net short position in Chicago Board of Trade corn futures in the week to Oct. 15, regulatory data released on Friday showed.
The Commodity Futures Trading Commission’s weekly commitments of traders report also showed that noncommercial traders, a category that includes hedge funds, trimmed their net short position in CBOT wheat and increased their net short position in soybeans.
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