Soyabean futures at the Chicago Board of Trade were higher early Thursday, recovering from this week's sell-off, traders said. August soya was up 2-1/2 cents at $6.46 per bushel and new-crop November was 1-1/4 higher at $6.54 by 10:40 am CDT (1540 GMT).
New-crop November soyabean futures reached a 2-1/2-month low this week and were nearing oversold technical levels. The nine-day relative strength index for the November contract dipped to 31 this week, just above the 30 level viewed as an oversold market by technicians.
But prices kept range-bound as traders evened positions before USDA's August crop production and supply/demand reports on Friday, with early volume on the lighter side. ADM Investor Services and Rand Financial were early buyers of November. Refco and Fimat Futures each sold 200 November, traders said.
The trade expects the government to cut its US 2005 soya crop estimate after this summer's drought in the eastern Midwest, but estimates were wide-ranging on how much the government will cut its projection.
On average, analysts expect the government to trim 86 million bushels from its July forecast of 2.89 billion.
There were 68 deliveries on the August soya contract early Thursday. Customers of First Options and ABN Amro stopped all of the soya.
Registrations with the CBOT unchanged at 1,124 lots.
The soya-product markets were following the moves in soyabeans, with trade on the quieter side ahead of USDA's August crop report, traders said.
August soyameal was up 50 cents at $208.50 per ton and August soyaoil was down 0.05 cent per lb at 22.67 cents.
US weekly export sales data was bearish for soyameal and supportive for soyaoil, traders said. USDA reported that 43,300 tonnes (old-crop and new-crop combined) of US soyameal were sold for export last week. That was below the range of estimates for 50,000 to 110,000 tonnes.
US soyaoil sales reached 13,300 tonnes (old-crop) of US soyaoil, compared with exports for 1,000 to 5,000 tonnes.
There were no August soyameal deliveries and CBOT meal registrations remained at zero.
Soyaoil deliveries against the August totalled 165 lots and there was scattered stopping of the soyaoil with the Bunge house account taking 58 lots.
Soyaoil registrations with the CBOT were unchanged at 2,934 lots.