Chicago Board of Trade soyabean futures rose in active trade on Thursday as concerns about the size of the US soyabean crop amid hot, dry weather blanketing the Midwest spurred speculative buying, traders said. Meteorlogix weather service said a drier and hotter weather pattern was setting up in the western US Midwest.
The eastern Midwest should not be as hot, but temperatures will still range above normal after Saturday. Only minor shower activity was expected in the Midwest over the next week to 10 days, Meteorlogix said.
"Things are not looking very good for farmers, particularly in the central Illinois area and even increasingly concerning for the western Corn Belt," Meteorlogix forecaster Joel Burgio said.
July soya was up 17-1/2 cents per bushel at $7.29 by 11:05 am CDT (1605 GMT) and new-crop November was 17 higher at $7.42.
Refco and R.J. O'Brien were among the featured buyers of November soyabeans.
Thursday was also the last trading day for July soyabean, soyaoil and soyameal futures. Traders said they expected a quiet expiration as open interest had shrunk to manageable levels going into the session. But July soyaoil was seeing added volatility as firms tried to exit positions before 12:01 pm CDT expiration.
The US Agriculture Department's export sales and the National Oilseed Processors Association's June crush data released early Thursday were viewed as neutral to bearish.
USDA said US export sales of soya last week totalled 175,100 tonnes (old and new crop combined), which was above expectations for 60,000 to 125,000 tonnes. But the amounts were 26 percent below the previous week and 28 percent under the four-week average. China did book a small amount of soyabeans, 2,800 tonnes, and shipped 58,800 tonnes. Exports were also quiet overnight.
NOPA said US processors crushed 125.257 million bushels of soyabeans last month, below trade estimates for 128 million to 131 million bushels and the May crush of 136.7 million. Registrations with the CBOT unchanged at 1,645 lots.
The soyameal and soyaoil markets also rallied following the strength in soyabeans. July soyameal was up $6.50 per ton at $230, with the deferreds up $3 to $6. July soyaoil was up 0.50 cent at 25.85 cents, while the back months were 0.15 to 0.43 cent higher.
USDA's export sales tally from last week was viewed as market neutral for soyameal and bearish for soyaoil. There were 79,500 tonnes of old-crop US soyameal sold for export last week, compared with estimates for 45,000 to 95,000 tonnes. In soyaoil, USDA reported no sales for last week. Traders had expected sales of 22,000 to 28,000 tonnes.