Chicago wheat turns sharply lower in technical selloff

CHICAGO: Chicago Board of Trade wheat  fell more than 1 percent on Thursday in a technical selloff amid outlooks for rain in the parched U.S. Plains crop belt, traders and analysts said.

Disappointing weekly U.S. wheat export sales added to headwinds, with CBOT May wheat dropping 7 cents to $4.81-3/4 per bushel, a two-week low.

The contract broke through support of its 200-day moving average, triggering long liquidation, according to Frontier Futures broker Joe Nussmeier. "That was a big chart moment," he said. "Some of those fast fund types exited."

Wheat traders have been balancing dry growing conditions in the southern Plains against record-large global wheat supplies. Rains next week in the northeast section of that region should boost soil moisture even although parts of Kansas and Oklahoma were likely to remain abnormally dry, meteorologists said.

"Markets are still undecided between ample supplies and climatic risks in America underpinning prices in Chicago," consultancy Agritel said in a note.

The state buyer for Egypt announced a purchase of 240,000 tonnes of Russian and Romanian wheat early on Thursday.

That was more wheat than the United States sold all of last week, when new sales totalled 219,500 tonnes, below expectations, according to U.S. Department of Agriculture data.

Meanwhile, export sales of U.S. corn of more than 2 million tonnes topped expectations and sales of about 1.3 million soybeans met estimates, USDA data showed.

CBOT May corn edged 1/4 cent lower to $3.88-1/2 per bushel, tracking declines in wheat.

CBOT May soybeans were up 13 cents at $10.45-1/4 per bushel as of 11:28 a.m. CDT (1628 GMT).

Soybeans were bolstered in part by short-covering and strong U.S. demand for crushing.

U.S. soybean plants crushed more bushels of the oilseed than expected in February, exceeding last year's processing pace for the month by 7.7 percent and shattering a previous February record set in 2010, the National Oilseed Processors Association (NOPA) said.