In the overnight session the grains were higher with March corn up ½ of a cent, January Soybeans up 10 cents and March Wheat up 2 ¼ cents. January soybeans is now trading above the $10.00 mark, an area of strong resistance all Fall. Soybeans is now back to price levels that we have traded at prior to the November WASDE report with a resistance level at $10.08 ¼.
Argentina precipitation over the last seven days has been strongest in the western part of the growing regions and relatively dry to the east. The soil moisture shows short to very short topsoil moisture in northern Argentina and marginally adequate to short moisture the other growing regions throughout the nation. The forecasts expects a ridge of high pressure to develop over Argentina next week which is expected to produce a number of high temperature days with little precipitation. There is concern that a net evaporation effect and deplete topsoil moisture which is critical for emergence of the newly planted crop.
The monthly Oilseed Crushings report released at 2 PM CST on Friday from the USDA estimated that 175.9 million bushels of soybeans were crushed in the month of October, this was a strong increase from September of 145 million bushels. The estimates were above analyst expectations which averaged at 174.7 million bushels and ranged from 171 to 175.8 million bushels. The report also showed that 2.22 billion pounds of soybean oil was produced which was a 19 percent jump from September.
The cash markets moved higher last week with corn basis up 3 cents and soybeans up 2 on average across the U.S. With harvest almost completely wrapped up, basis will have an opportunity to gain some ground going into the new year as farmers have filled and locked the bins and marketing stored grain is not necessarily high on their priority list.
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