Soybean and corn futures slipped on Thursday, pressured by disappointing US export sales, forecasts for mostly favourable Midwest weather and technical selling. Chicago Board of Trade wheat rose on better-than-expected export sales. "We had a nice bounce in corn and soybeans, so it's a technical pullback," said Suderman, senior market analyst at Illinois-based Water Street Advisory.
"We go into the (August 12 US Department of Agriculture) report with a lot of people believing we have two big crops out there, corn and soybeans, while others are starting to see problems. "I think we're going to see this choppiness for some time." Showers are easing any concerns about dry spots in Illinois and Indiana, Commodity Weather Group said.
Chicago Board of Trade new-crop November soybeans fell 10 cents, or 1 percent, to $9.43-1/4 a bushel. December corn eased 2-3/4 cents, or 0.9 percent, to $3.80-1/2 a bushel. The USDA reported a net cancellation of 500,000 tonnes on old-crop US soybean purchases by China. It was the largest single-week cancellation by China since July 2011, according to USDA data, and only partly offset by net new-crop sales totalling 426,000 tonnes. With the new marketing year less than a month away, and following record-large imports from South America this summer, Chinese buyers were believed to be rolling some of their US purchases to 2015/16, traders said.
The report showed net cancellations for corn totaling 2,700 tonnes for 2014/15, while net sales for 2015/16 totalled 277,000 tonnes, below trade expectations. A raised US soybean crop forecast from private analytical firm Informa Economics helped counter a rally in which soybean futures hit a one-week high on Wednesday. "Every new forecast seems to be bringing something new and the market seems to be reacting to that pretty quickly," said Phin Ziebell, agribusiness economist, National Australia Bank.
Informa projected US soybean output at 3.789 billion bushels, up from a July 8 estimate of 3.77 billion. The company left its corn output estimate unchanged at 13.412 billion bushels. Favourable prospects for corn production in the United States, South America and Ukraine tempered concern about heat damage to corn in the European Union. September wheat added 5 cents, or 1 percent, to $5.07 a bushel. USDA reported export sales of US wheat in the latest week at 838,500 tonnes for 2015/16, a marketing year high that topped trade expectations.
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