Chinese corn drops

BEIJING/SINGAPORE: Corn prices in China's key Shandong hub have fallen to the same levels as wheat this week, for the first time in a year, leading some feed producers to switch back to using more of the yellow grain in animal feed rations, traders and analysts said.

Corn prices in key animal-feeding hubs such as Shandong province had been trading at a rare sustained premium to wheat for most of the past year. That's because corn production hiccups and a drawdown in stocks last year led to a slide in supply that pushed domestic prices to record highs.

Costly corn in turn spurred industrial corn users to look for alternatives, including feed lots that switched to using record volumes of feed-grade wheat.