In the overnight session the grains were mostly unchanged with corn down 3/4 of a cent, soybeans down 3/4 of a cent and wheat gaining 1 1/4 cents going into the morning pause. Oil is trading 68 cents higher and the U.S. dollar is down 1/10th of a percent. South Korea purchased 63,000 metric tons of corn late yesterday.
This week in Kansas City, crop scouts met Thursday afternoon to release the final wheat yield and production forecast after three days on the tour. The wheat council’s Kansas crop forecast was 35.9 bushels per acre which is well below the 5 year average of 40.3 bushels per acre. They also pegged production at 288.5 million bushels per acre which was down from the 5 year average of 331.6 million bushels. The wheat forecast reflected an early season drought, winterkill events and observed disease throughout the three day tour.
China is expected to produce 232 million metric tons of corn for 2015/16 which is up 7.6 percent year over year. Farmers have had incentive to plant more corn as a result of Beijing’s high price stockpile policy which has kept domestic corn prices as much as 30 percent higher than global prices. As a result of the excellent crop this year Chinese corn imports are expected to fall 2 million metric tons this year, while sorghum imports are expected to grow to 8.2 million metric tons from 8 million metric tons this year.
Precipitation looks to clear up for most of next week giving the western grain belt more opportunity to get into the fields. The 6-10 day forecast shows drier than normal conditions from eastern South Dakota and Nebraska to Ohio which should continue to support strong planting progress. Precipitation reenters the forecast in the 8-14 day outlook with above average moisture blanketing most of the U.S.
