Chicago | Reuters — U.S. soybean futures firmed on Tuesday on signs that export demand for U.S. supplies remained firm even as South American farmers harvest their crops.
Corn and wheat futures were mixed, with nearby contracts easing and deferred offerings rising.
“It is really a mixed bag out here,” said Mark Gold, managing partner at Top Third Ag Marketing.
Expectations of a protracted conflict between grain exporters Russia and Ukraine heightened concerns over global supplies and lent support to deferred wheat and corn contracts.
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Ukrainian ports remained closed and the country is likely to export just 200,000 tonnes of wheat from March to June, analyst APK-Inform said on Monday, as it cut its 2021-22 forecast for Ukrainian wheat exports to 18.3 million tonnes from 22.5 million.
Farmers in Ukraine hope to harvest around four million hectares (9.9 million acres) of winter wheat from the 6.5 million that were planted, the country’s Agriculture Minister Roman Leshchenko said.
But traders noted that the United States was still struggling to win fresh business, keeping deferred gains in check.
Chicago Board of Trade May soft red winter wheat ended down one cent at $11.18-1/4 a bushel (all figures US$). Traders said that a technical correction in spreads supported back-month wheat contracts in addition to the worries about Black Sea shipments.
CBOT May soybeans were up 5-1/2 cents at $16.96-1/2 a bushel.
Private exporters reported the sale of 240,000 tonnes of soybeans to unknown destinations for delivery in the 2021-22 marketing year, the U.S. Agriculture Department said.
CBOT May corn was down 3-1/4 cents at $7.53 a bushel. New-crop December futures were six cents higher at $6.70 and set a fresh contract high.
Ukraine’s Leshchenko said that corn plantings in his country were expected to fall to 3.3 million hectares in 2022 from 5.4 million in 2021.
— Mark Weinraub is a Reuters commodities correspondent in Chicago; additional reporting by Gus Trompiz in Paris and Naveen Thukral in Singapore.
