Grain > Commentary > 4-6-2021

4/6/2021

Apr 06, 2021

4/6/2021
A bit of a replay from yesterday with corn mixed and beans higher in quiet fashion for the second consecutive day. Yesterday, the USDA released their first weekly crop progress report for the 2021 year and the early season reports typically don't give trade a whole lot to work with. Corn planting in the US was seen at 2% complete, matching the yearly average for this time. Spring Wheat is estimated at 3% complete, slightly ahead of the 2% yearly average. The Winter Wheat condition was the number trade was most looking forward to after the cold snap in mid-February sent wheat futures surging on speculation the wheat crop suffered significant damage. Winter wheat was seen at 53% good-to-excellent, a 7% increase from November's rating, and 4% headed, slightly ahead of the 3% yearly average. We are starting to see market analyst estimates for Friday's WASDE report, with most expecting to see a 100 million bushel or larger cut in the corn carryout number which currently sits at 1.5 billion bushels. Analysts also expect a 2-5 million bushel decrease in the soybean carryout number. If looking to price grain this week, implement sell orders as an attempt capture part of the possible high price spikes we see before and after report releases.

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8/12/2025
Aug 12, 2025
The USDA report today didn't treat the corn market very well.  Both corn acres and yield were higher the result has corn carryout over 2.1 billion bushels.  Corn yield was pegged at 188.8 bpa vs an estimate of 184.29 bpa.  How high is 188.8?  Well…the previous record was 179.3.  Planted corn acres were put at 97.3 million.  Total corn production is estimated at 16.742 billion bushels, which is 763 million more than the report estimates.
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.