Grain > Commentary > 8-18-2021

8/18/2021

Aug 18, 2021

8/18/2021
The markets were mostly quiet throughout the overnight and day sessions.  Corn and soybeans both traded on either side of unchanged with corn finishing 1-3 higher and soybeans 4-10 lower.  The USDA confirmed another private export sale of 131,000 tonnes of soybeans to China for the 2021/2022 marketing year.  This makes the 10th consecutive business day with a sale announcement.  ProFarmer tour found some good crops in Nebraska and Indiana yesterday and, overall, is finding some healthy crops in Western Iowa and Illinois today.  According to those on the crop tour, Indiana's corn crop has potential to be better than 2020's (state record yield) and the soybeans continue improve as they move west from Ohio into Iowa.  Weekly ethanol numbers were off, again, with output down 13,000 bpd from the previous week to 973,000 bpd.  Ethanol stocks were down 718,000 bbls to 21.56 million bbls.  The pace for ethanol corn usage for the year is close to the USDA's forecasted 5.05 billion bushels.  The forecasted rain for our area at the end of this week has increased in chance and amount.

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1/12/2026
Jan 12, 2026
Well, the USDA report had a bit of a surprise today and not in a good way.  Not only did they increase the 2025 corn yield, from 186.0 to 186.5, they also increased Harvest Acres from 90 million to 91.3 million.  That raised the total corn production to 17.021 billion, up an additional 269 million bushels from their previous estimate.  U.S. Ending Stocks are now estimated at 2.227 bbu, vs. 2.209 in Dec.  Report trade guesses were at 1.97 bbu.
11/14/2025
Nov 14, 2025
It was USDA report day today and overall, it was bearish for both corn and beans.  Corn Yield was only reduced by .7 bpa down to 186 bpa.  The market was expecting closer to 184 bpa.  Corn production is estimated at 16.752 billion vs 16.814 billion in September.  They raised exports 100 million, which is debatable, but possible.  Ending stocks on corn were estimated at 2.154 billion bushels, which is up 44 million from September and about 29 million more than the market expected. 
9/12/2025
Sep 12, 2025
USDA report day.  Corn and beans were trading higher pre-report on thoughts of a reduction to yields.  Well....we got what we were thinking but the USDA decided to throw a twist into the mix.  The 25/26 corn yield decreased slightly less than expected by 2.1 bu to 186.7 bpa, but they gave us the largest planted acreage shift on this report in at least the last 20 years (+1.4 mil acres) spurred an increase in production to 16,814 mbu.  25/26 ending stocks were slightly lowered by 7 mbu to 2,110 mbu.