Corn and soybeans posted small gains in the overnight session while wheat continued to dip for a third consecutive day. In outside markets, S&P futures extended Monday’s gains while crude oil was lower.
Corn found some support on Monday as a large export deal was announced by USDA that saw Mexico buying over 900,000 MT of US corn for 2015/16 and 487,000 MT of corn for 2016/17 delivery. This helped offset the poor export inspections data also released on Monday that showed only 373,000 MT of corn for the week, versus trade expectations of 650- to 850,000.
Soybeans also were helped by another deal by China which saw the number one soybean buyer purchasing 180,000 MT of US soybeans. The deal was announced on Monday from the USDA’s export sales program. Weekly export inspections for soybeans of 2,169,000 MT also topped analyst expectations which ranged from 1,900,000 to 2,100,000 MT. Also on Monday, NOPA’s October crush estimate was released showing 158.9 MB of soybeans crushed for October. This compared to a 161 MB expectation by the trade, with the range of analyst estimates varying from 58.5 to 164.8 MB.
In wheat, USDA reported a slight bump in the condition of the US winter wheat crop as it went from 51% good-to-excellent last week to 52% this week. This still remains off from last year’s reading of 60%. Export inspections for the week were also disappointing coming in at 279,000 MT versus a trade expectation ranging from 300- to 450,000 MT.
S&P futures (ESZ5) were higher Tuesday as investors anticipated data on consumer inflation, earnings from retailers, and a number of speeches from Federal Reserve officials. The Consumer Price Index, after declining for two months because of lower energy and import costs, is forecast to increase by 0.2% in October. CPI will be released at 8:30 a.m. EST. Industrial production for October will be released at 9:15 a.m. and is expected to show a slight gain of 0.1% after two months of declines.
The risk of trading futures, hedging, and speculating can be substantial. Grain Hedge is a dba of Foremost Trading LLC (NFA ID: 0307930)
