Paris wheat ticks lower in pause after rally

PARIS: Euronext wheat edged down on Wednesday as a sharp fall in Chicago encouraged Paris prices to consolidate after a five-month high a day earlier.

A fall in the euro to its lowest level since late July against the dollar limited the drop on Euronext, while a price rally in top wheat exporting country Russia continued to underpin the market, traders said.

Front-month December milling wheat, the most active contract on Paris-based Euronext, settled down 0.75 euro, or 0.4%, at 194.00 euros ($226.71) a tonne.

The contract had risen on Tuesday to 195.75 euros, its highest since April 23, but faced chart resistance around that level.

Chicago wheat was pressured by a rising dollar, which turned attention to limited US sales during a recent flurry of purchases by importing countries.

Non-commercial market participants increased their net long position in Euronext's milling wheat futures and options last week, data published by Euronext showed.

A tender by Egypt on Tuesday, in which state buyer GASC bought 405,000 tonnes of Russian wheat, added to a run of international demand.

The tender also highlighted the surge in Russian prices , to the extent that some suppliers offered French supplies that had previously been much more expensive due to a small French harvest.

Traders were waiting to see when Algeria, usually the main overseas market for French wheat, would hold a new wheat tender after reportedly changing its terms to allow Black Sea origins such as Russian wheat.

In a tender for feed barley this week, Algerian state grain agency OAIC is believed to have purchased about 117,000 tonnes, traders said in initial assessments.