Corn spot basis bids held steady at elevators and river terminals in the US Midwest on Friday, but processor bids firmed slightly in an effort to entice farmers as crop sales remained slow, dealers said. Soya bids held mostly steady while producers focused on field work rather than booking sales, dealers said.
"Crops are slow to come in from the country. Movement is stagnant," a rail broker said. Farmers in the eastern Midwest were busy with planting activities, while rainy and wet weather condition pushed some farmers in the western Midwest out of the fields, dealers said.
Wet weather will blanket most of the US Midwest by the weekend into early next week, which will delay early corn plantings but also add valuable soil moisture. Export demand for corn and soyabeans has picked up at the US Gulf, a dealer on the Mississippi River said.
A corn processor in Illinois improved its bid by 5 cents and a processor in Blair, Nebraska improved its bid by 2-1/2 cents. A soyabean processor bid improved by 4 cents in Des Moines, Iowa and slipped by 1 cent on the Illinois River. Chicago Board of Trade corn futures closed lower Friday in the face of a firmer dollar, lower equities on concerns about a slowing economy in China, and crop-nourishing rain in the US Midwest.