US FOB Gulf corn and soyabean basis offers were steady to higher on Tuesday mainly due to slow country movement and higher freight to move the grain to export elevators, traders said.
Slow farmer selling due to weather-related price swings has tightened spot supplies flowing to the Gulf while lower corn prices prompted renewed interest in US corn. Export demand had eased slightly as corn prices approached a five-week peak earlier this month. "Exporters are starting to need some more corn to fill all the business they've been lining up," a corn trader said.
Soyabean export premiums held steady, supported by high barge freight and sluggish country movement. "There's little export demand," said a soyabean trader. "If there was any more we would be in trouble because we couldn't buy the stuff."
China was expected to buy limited amounts of US soyabeans in July and August as the country struggles to unload record amounts that arrived from South America in June, said traders in Asia.
Soft red winter wheat premiums advanced as traders adjusted prices following a recent tender by Egypt's GASC. The Egyptian tender provided hard prices for what companies would charge for US wheat. Traders usually base prices on the US rail and barge markets, which supply export elevators. However, high prices have limited business, making the markets thin and poorly defined.
In the GASC tender, US soft red winter wheat was offered for as much as 20 cents a bushel premium to CBOT September for August 16-31 shipment. As a result, traders raised SRW wheat basis offers to 15 cents over, up from 5 cents over last week.
US hard red winter wheat was offered to Egypt at 68 to 80 cents premium, prompting traders to keep export premiums at current levels of 75 cents over.
"The bids to GASC are a little more realistic than the track bids," said a US wheat trader. "There's not a lot of liquidity in the track market."
In exports, CCC will tender on July 25 to buy 14,410 tonnes of HRW wheat, minimum 12 percent protein, for Haiti for delivery to the vessel from late August through October.