The grains continued their selling in the overnight after a sharp day lower caused by significant fund liquidation. Going into the morning pause in trading corn is down 6 cents, soybeans is trading down 6 cents and wheat is 5 ¾ cents lower. March soybeans has broken through $10 and currently trades at $9.98 which is the low side of the range it has been trading in since late October. This morning two reportable sales were announced at 8 AM CST including 102,750 metric tons of old crop soybeans to unknown destinations, 100,000 metric tons of new crop soybeans to unknown destinations and 125,000 metric tons of corn to Taiwan for 2014/15 delivery. Today is the 5th and final day in the annual five day re-balancing period for commodity index funds.
Thursday the 15th will be another important day for traders to watch closely. NOPA crush numbers for December will be released at 11 AM CST and are expected to show a record for number of bushels crushed for that month. Analysts expect to see 166.9 million bushels of soybeans crushed in the month of December above the previous record of 165.384 in December of 2013. The analysts crush guesses range from 164.263-171.135 million bushels. Analysts expect the average soyoil stocks to reach 1.122 billion pounds up from 1.005 billion pounds in November. Also on Thursday, Informa Economics will release its 2015 acreage forecast update which will include implications for U.S. production in the 15/16 marketing year.
Although the U.S. wheat market hasn’t been able to find any traction after printing highs of $6.77 on December 18th it appears French wheat has been benefiting the Russian curb in exports. Farm office FranceAgriMer cut French 14/15 soft wheat ending stocks to 4.34 million metric tons from 4.55 million metric tons last month. Exports were also increased to 8.8 million metric tons compared to 8.5 million metric tons last month.
