US FOB soyabean export premiums fell on Monday due to a seasonal slowdown in activity, while corn basis offers held steady, traders said. The lack of grain moving pressured soyabean values in the CIF barge market.
However, heavy loadings of corn at the Gulf and strong export sales last week supported corn values. Taiwan was expected to seek corn and soyabeans this week, even as higher futures prices hit demand, traders said.
The Breakfast Soybean Procurement Association, the island's largest soyabean buying group, would likely seek a long-delayed shipment of up to 60,000 tonnes of US soyabeans this week, but the shipment date and tender time were still undecided, an official said.
The group in mid-November passed on a shipment of up to 60,000 tonnes of US of Brazilian soyabeans due to price and have yet to re-tender. The last shipment the group purchased was in late October.
The Members Feed Industry Group, one of the largest corn importers, will re-tender on Tuesday for a 40,000-60,000 tonne shipment of US corn after failing to secure a cargo last week in a tender due to price.
Buyers in Japan and South Korea were expected to be mostly quiet this week. Hard and soft red winter wheat export premiums held steady amid little new export business, traders said.
In its December report released on Monday, USDA reduced US wheat export estimates for 2006/07 to 900 million bushels, down from 925 million bushels in the November report.
Over the weekend, Egypt's GASC bought 260,000 tonnes of wheat, including 55,000 tonnes of US soft red winter wheat and 60,000 tonnes of US soft white wheat. The government agency also purchased Argentine, Russian and French wheat for shipment January 5-20.
Iraq's tender for 100,000 tonnes of wheat closed on Saturday but traders expect government officials in the war-torn country to take several weeks or months to finalise a purchase. In the meantime, Iraq was working on shipping some of the 700,000 tonnes of US wheat it has already purchased, traders said.