US corn and wheat futures climbed on Tuesday to their highest levels in more than a month, as technical and speculative buying pushed up prices in the face of advancing US harvests. Soya futures also traded higher, led by gains in soyameal.
The rallies will likely be short-lived as farmers are bringing in record-large US corn and soya crops from their fields, traders said. Prices rose after corn and soya futures touched one-week lows during the session as forecasters called for favourable weather conditions to speed up harvest progress after rain delays.
"We continue to see the funds position and reposition themselves in the market, which is the primary reason behind recent trade," said Karl Setzer, market analyst for MaxYield Co-operative. Chicago Board of Trade December corn ended 2.2 percent higher at $3.56 a bushel after trading as high as $3.58-3/4, the highest price for a nearby contract since September 2.
December wheat gained 1.1 percent to $5.19-1/4 a bushel after touching a session high of $5.23-3/4, the highest price for a front-month contract since September 10. November soyabeans jumped 2.1 percent to $9.64-1/4 a bushel after dropping more than 2 percent in the previous two sessions. December soyameal soared 4 percent to $342.90 per short ton. Commodity funds bought a net 9,000 corn contracts, 8,000 soyabean contracts, 4,000 soyameal contract, and 3,000 wheat contracts, traders said.
Gains did not "have anything to do with harvest," said Jim Gerlach, president of A/C Trading. "You're looking almost exclusively at money flow coming in." US farmers had harvested 53 percent of their soyabean crop as of Sunday, up from 40 percent a week earlier but below the five-year average of 66 percent, the US Department of Agriculture said in a weekly crop report on Monday.
The corn harvest was 31 percent complete, up from 24 percent a week earlier and below the average of 53 percent. Rainy weather that slowed harvesting in the US Midwest this month also stalled the planting of winter wheat, a delay that could threaten crop yields, experts said. Still, questions remained about global demand for US soft red winter wheat, which is traded at the CBOT. Egypt, the world's top wheat importer, said on Tuesday it had bought 180,000 tonnes of French, Romanian and Russian wheat in an international tender.
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