Grain > Commentary > 12-3-2021

12/3/2021

Dec 03, 2021

12/3/2021
Corn and soybeans go into the weekend higher with a flood of speculator money coming in to buy.  Fundamentals have not changed much, if it all, but the USDA did put together a nice string of soybean export sales announcements this week including another 122,000 tonnes for delivery to unknown during the 2021/22 marketing year confirmed this morning.  Export sales and inspections for soybeans are currently ahead of the pace needed to hit the USDA target but the situation could change quickly with the Brazil harvest and export season likely to get an early start.  There is some chatter about isolated dryness in South America but conditions have been almost perfect so far with farmers in Brazil's largest soy producing state Mato Grosso expecting a record crop.  If we learned anything this year, "dryness" should probably not be a bullish positioning point.  Corn played follow-the-leader today behind soybeans and we are looking for a wakeup call on the PNW market for corn like we saw in soybeans this week.  Cash closes for the week:  cash corn down 5 cents, cash soybeans up 14.  New crop closes: corn down 10 cents and soybeans down 6.  The lottery/casino action in wheat and oats continued today with all posting double digit losses, taking back most of the prior day's gains.

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8/12/2025
Aug 12, 2025
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5/12/2025
May 12, 2025
News broke Sunday that the USA and China have agreed to ease tensions and lower tariffs.  The US is lowering tariffs on Chinese goods from 145% to 30%.  China is lowering their import tariffs from 125% to 10%.  Talks will resume in the coming weeks.  This news had stocks, grains and oil higher overnight. Then of course we had a USDA grain report come out at 11:00 this morning.  That was also a bit friendly.
3/31/2025
Mar 31, 2025
USDA reported corn planting acres at 95.326 million acres of corn, which would be up a little more than 5% from 2024's final number and the second highest March figure of the last ten years behind only 2020's estimate of 96.99 mil acres.  US corn stocks as of March 1st were seen at 81.51 billion bushels, which was exactly what the trade had expected and was down just over 2% from March 1 of 2024.  USDA said farmers intended to plant 83.495 million acres of soybeans, which would be down about 4% from last year and was just a hair smaller than what the trade was looking for.  March 1 soybean stocks were pegged at 1.91 billion bu's, which again was nearly exactly as the trade had expected, and was up 3.5% compared to March 1, 2024.