Basis bids for US Plains hard red winter wheat were steady to weaker Tuesday as the market continued to adjust to only very light farmer sales, mostly filled pipelines and only light mill demand. While bids were mostly steady, the basis did dropped 5 to 8 cents in some Kansas locations, merchants said.
Meanwhile, seeding of the new HRW wheat crop was continuing, although at a slow pace. Seeding in the top producing state of Kansas was at 7 percent as of Sunday, while Oklahoma was at 12 percent, Texas was at 9 percent and Nebraska was at 35 percent, according to the US Department of Agriculture. All were lagging the five-year average pace.
In world wheat news Tuesday, the Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics cut its forecast of that country's wheat crop to 15.5 million tonnes from its previous forecast in June of 22.5 million tonnes.
Export demand remained strong. The state-run Trading Corp of Pakistan (TCP) will issue a tender this week to import up to 500,000 tonnes of milling wheat, a senior official said on Tuesday.
Also this week, Japan's Ministry of Agriculture is seeking to buy a total of 115,000 tonnes of milling wheat from the United States and Canada at a regular tender closing on Thursday, a ministry official said on Tuesday.