3/15/2021

After spending most of last week on the lower side of range, corn and beans were both weaker overnight and in the early portion of the day session.  The situation in Brazil did not offer much to feed the bulls over the weekend.  Brazil is estimated to be 80% complete with their soybean harvest and the second crop corn is near 90% planted.  Weekly export inspections were extremely supportive for the market, including a near all-time record of 2.204 million tonnes of corn inspected, this was well above the top estimate and the largest single week since 1989.  Wheat was also above estimates with 683k tonnes and soybean inspections were strong with 519k tonnes inspected for export.  Market reacted very positive to this report with corn trading 10 higher.  The NOPA crush numbers for February were also released at 11am this morning.  Most analysts were expecting a record February report at 168.6 million bushels crushed but the numbers were well short of that.  February NOPA crush was reported at 155.1 mln bu, which was a 17-month low and 7% below February 2020.  Today was the first day for the increased spec position limits in grains.  Funds and spec traders can now hold a total of 57,800 corn positions and 27,300 soybean positions. This is nearly double the prior limits.  This may make the planting intentions report all the more interesting in terms of market reaction.