7/28/2021

Quiet, two-sided trade overnight and throughout the day.  Corn and soybeans both continue to consolidate, trading smaller daily ranges.  Funds remain sidelined for the most part, letting time and weather pass by, looking for indicators on potential yield changes for this year's crop before making any significant moves.  A surprise thunderstorm this morning saw approximately .5" of rain in the Benson area and <.1" in Murdock.  The inverse between the September and December corn contracts has almost disappeared with December closing at a 1/2 cent discount to September.  As a basis play, this spread returning to a carry may trigger some buyers to cancel old crop purchases and roll them to December, creating the possibility of the 2020/21 corn ending stocks increasing going into harvest.  It was rumored that China was in the market today for a large volume of US new crop corn.  Weekly ethanol numbers showed production down 14,000 bpd to 1.01 million bpd.  Ethanol stocks were up 215,000 barrels to 22.73 million.  Tomorrow's weekly export sales report is expected to be weak for both soybeans and wheat.  Early yield reports showing spring wheat production down about 30% from last year saw Minneapolis wheat futures return to the 900 level.