SINGAPORE: Chicago soybean futures lost more ground on Thursday, with prices hitting a one-week low as rapidly progressing U.S. planting pressured prices.
Wheat slid for a fourth session in a row on good weather for crop development in parts of the U.S. Midwest.
“U.S. weather is favourable for soybeans,” said one Singapore-based trader. “It is bit early to predict as U.S. farmers are just planting beans, but a bumper U.S. crop this year will add to ample supplies from a record Brazilian harvest.”
The most-active soybean contract on the Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT) fell 0.4% to $13.98-3/4 a bushel, as of 0230 GMT, after hitting its lowest since May 3 at $13.97 a bushel.
Wheat dropped 0.4% to $6.39 a bushel and corn lost 0.5% to $5.91-1/4 a bushel.
Fast pace of U.S. planting and forecasts of favourable growing weather are weighing on soybean prices.
However, Argentina’s Rosario Grains exchange cut its forecast for the 2022/2023 soybean harvest by 6.5% to 21.5 million tonnes, it said on Wednesday, as the effects of adverse weather hit the country’s top crop.
In the wheat market, talks over the Black Sea export deal take centre stage.
Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said on Wednesday he thought the Ukraine Black Sea grain deal could be extended for at least two more months, as officials from the parties involved held the first day of talks on an extension in Istanbul.
Russia has said it would not extend the pact beyond May 18 unless a list of demands is met to remove obstacles to its own grain and fertilizer exports. Cavusoglu was speaking to reporters on his return from a trip to Moscow.
Export prices for Russian wheat weakened amid continued high export volumes, uncertainty surrounding the Black Sea grain deal and in anticipation of a new crop, analysts said on Wednesday.
Soft wheat exports from the European Union in the 2022/23 season that started last July reached 26.49 million tonnes by May 7, up 11% compared with 23.87 million a year earlier, data published by the European Commission showed on Wednesday.
Commodity funds were net sellers of CBOT soybean, wheat and soyoil futures contracts on Wednesday, traders said. The funds were net buyers of CBOT corn and soymeal futures.