Chicago Board of Trade wheat futures closed higher on Friday, with the spot May contract climbing to a session high toward the close on technical buying including short-covering, traders said. CBOT May soft red winter wheat settled up 4 cents at $4.64-1/2 per bushel. For the week, the contract fell 3-1/4 cents or 0.7 percent, after a 2 percent climb the previous week.
K.C. May hard red winter wheat ended up 3-3/4 cents at $4.34-1/4 a bushel on Friday while MGEX May spring wheat fell 2 cents to settled at $5.31-1/4. Still, MGEX May spring wheat recorded a weekly rise of 8-3/4 cents per bushel or 1.7 percent, snapping a two-week slide. MGEX spring wheat futures drew support this week from worries that a blizzard in the northern US Plains would inhibit spring wheat planting.
Egypt's main state wheat buyer purchased 240,000 tonnes of wheat in an international tender, including 180,000 tonnes of Romanian origin and 60,000 tonnes of Ukrainian wheat. Excluding costs for ocean freight, the lowest offer in the tender was for US soft red winter wheat, but when freight costs were added, the Romanian and Ukrainian wheat was cheaper.