BEIJING: Chicago corn futures hit a more-than-one-year high on Tuesday, with soybeans also rising on worries of a drought in Argentina and rains in Brazil. The most active corn contract on the Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT) gained 1.03% to $4.89 a bushel, highest since Dec. 8, 2023, by 0444 GMT after a long weekend. The exchange was shut on Monday for the Martin Luther King Jr. Day holiday.
CBOT soybeans added 1.28% to $10.47 a bushel. Wheat added 1.76% to $5.42-2/8 a bushel. Recent rains in Argentina’s agricultural heartland failed to alleviate concerns that the ongoing drought could further hurt crop yields, the Rosario grains exchange said, days after flagging that the nation’s corn and soybean production will be smaller than its previous forecasts.
In Brazil, soybean harvest for the 2024-25 season is at its lowest for this time of the year since the 2020-21 cycle due to excessive rains in top grain-producing state Mato Grosso. Algerian state agency ONAB has issued international tenders to purchase up to 240,000 metric tons of animal feed corn and about 50,000 tons of soymeal, European traders said.
Russian wheat export prices declined last week in the face of competitive offers from other global exporters. In major importer China, officials and ordinary people are hopeful but on edge as Donald Trump returned to the White House, eager to avoid a repeat of the bruising trade war that drove a wedge between the economic superpowers during his first term. China’s soybean imports from the United States had dropped 5.7% in 2024 from the previous year and were replaced by Brazilian and Argentine shipments as fears of a renewed Sino-US trade war hammered the US market share to 21%.
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