US soyabean futures firmed on Monday on follow-through buying after a smaller-than-expected US government crop estimate last week, with prospects for a pick-up in export demand lending support, analysts said. Corn futures fell as traders unwound long corn/short soyabeans spreads. Wheat was choppy in thin trade, with most US government offices closed for the federal Columbus Day holiday.
At the Chicago Board of Trade as of 12:15 pm CDT (1715 GMT), November soyabeans were up 3 cents at $8.88-3/4 per bushel. December corn was down 1-3/4 cents at $3.81 a bushel. December wheat was down 1/2 cent at $5.08-3/4 a bushel. Soyabeans climbed in early moves after the US Department of Agriculture on Friday lowered its domestic soyabean crop estimate to 3.888 billion bushels, below an average of trade estimates. "I don't see a lot of fundamental support other than a boost from Friday," said Brian Hoops with Midwest Market Solutions, adding that the market drew light support from hopes of fresh US sales to top soya buyer China.
However, CBOT soyabeans came off session highs as the USDA's forecast for a record-large global soya crop in 2015/16 hung over the market. Corn futures lost ground to soyabeans on inter-market spreads and expectations of a pick-up in the US harvest pace. Farmers are expected to turn their attention to corn in the coming days, after a stretch of warm mostly dry weather in the Midwest allowed them to complete much of the soyabean harvest.
"I'd suspect that up here in Minnesota, we will be 50 percent harvested on corn by the end of the week.... On beans, you can basically call that done, for the most part," said Mark Schultz, analyst with Northstar Commodity in Minneapolis. The USDA said the US corn harvest was 27 percent complete and soyabeans were 42 percent complete by October 4, with the next weekly progress update due on Tuesday.
CBOT wheat futures sputtered in sympathy with weakness in corn and on strong competition for export business. Egypt's state grain buyer, the world's biggest importer of wheat, bought 180,000 tonnes of Russian and Romanian wheat in a tender on Friday. Saudi Arabia was thought to have bought European wheat in a tender for 740,000 tonnes on Monday.
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