Good afternoon. Headline trading was the name of the game again throughout the day on Thursday, as reports of a completed phone call between President Trump and President Xi hit newswires during the pause this morning, leading to increased volatility throughout the early part of the morning session. Details of the call are still mostly lacking, but that the two leaders had dialogue was enough to lift corn and soybean values to their third consecutive day of green closes, while also pulling wheat higher.

CN closed Thursday at 4.39 and 1/2, up 3/4 of a cent. CZ was up 4 and 1/2 cents at 4.48 and 1/4. SN finished at 10.51 and 3/4, up 6 and 3/4. SX closed at 10.33 and 1/4, up 8 and 1/4. WN was up 2 and 1/4 at 5.45 and 1/2. Products were mixed, July soybean meal closed at 297.10, unchanged on the day, and July soybean oil closed at 46.65, down 16 points. Cattle markets closed Thursday in the green, August live cattle closed at 216.82, up $4.47, and August feeders closed at 309.15, up $5.27. Both had gap-higher opens and both also made new contract highs. July hogs closed at 104.80, down 22 cents. Outside markets are trading mixed, crude oil futures are up 40-50 cents/bbl, the Dow Jones index is down 40 points, and the US$ index is trading either side of unchanged; the S&P500 is down 20 points, and the NASDAQ is down 100 points. Inside day for crude oil and an outside day for the stock index futures.

Spreads spent the day trading mixed, with corn spreads down 3 and 3/4 to up a penny, and soybean spreads down 2 and 3/4 to up 3/4. CN/CU closed at 8, down 2 and 3/4, and SN/SQ closed at 5 and 1/4, down a penny. New low for the move in the CN/CU, and also new contract lows again for the CU/CZ.

In a post on his Truth Social social media platform, President Trump said earlier this morning that he and President Xi had a "very good" phone call that lasted around an hour and a half. Trump mentioned the two spent nearly the entirety of the call discussing trade, adding that there should be no further questions regarding the complexity of rare Earth metals. Most important in the post though was that a team of Treasury Secretary Bessent, Commerce Secretary Lutnick, and USTR Greer would be having an in-person meeting with their Chinese counterparts at a time and location yet to be determined. The meeting, should it in-fact take place, would seem to indicate that at least some sort of progress was made after several days of what felt like momentum in the opposite direction.

Staying on the trade front, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz met President Trump at the White House earlier today for talks regarding trade between the two countries, as well as discussions regarding the ongoing situation with Ukraine. Unlike previous Oval Office meetings, this discussion seemed to be far more cordial, with Trump calling Merz a good representative of Germany, and the latter thanking Trump repeatedly for his hospitality. It did not appear there was any sort of substantial developments on any of the subjects, but amid ongoing tensions between the US and the EU, that conversations were had at all with a bloc member is likely to be construed as positive.

Ag specific news for the day included the weekly export sales report for the week ending May 29th which was released first thing this morning. The report showed old crop corn sales in the week at 942k mt's, with featured buyers being Mexico (362,300 mt's), Japan (173,500 mt's), and Korea (138,600 mt's); unknown destinations in the week assigned out/rolled/canceled 227,800 mt's. Old crop soybean sales totaled 194k mt's, with the featured buyer in the week being Bangladesh at 57,500 mt's. Lastly, old crop wheat sales in the last week of the their marketing year totaled (49k) mt's; purchases of 65,300 mt's from Korea offset cancelations of 66,800 mt's from Mexico, while unknown destinations also canceled or rolled 81,300 mt's. On the new cop side, wheat sales totaled 445k mt's in the week, with featured buyers being Nigeria (131,000 mt's) and Mexico (108,400 mt's); unknown destinations also purchased 140,500 mt's. New crop corn sales totaled 160k mt's in the week, and new crop soybean sales totaled just 3.5k mt's.

Mid-day weather forecasts on Thursday continued to trend wetter across the southern part of the Midwest and into the mid-south, but otherwise still offer mostly the same pattern that has been seen all week. Another couple less organized storm systems look to work through the Midwest over the weekend and into the first part of next week, while temperatures still look to warm up for most of the Corn Belt beyond next week. Week two forecasts still show ridging present in the western US into the back half of June, but this allows ridge riding storms to work into the eastern Midwest, which is keeping precip anomalies above average here and especially in the southeast. Whether this ridge works its way east is the current million dollar question, as this would likely lead to hot/dry weather for the Midwest and Corn Belt.

Checking in on global weather, much of the focus outside of the US remains in China, where drought conditions have taken a toll on the country's wheat crop over the past month. 10-day forecasts from the EU model show just light/scattered precip chances here, while temperatures in the same timeframe also look to stay above average. Working to the west, the Russian wheat belt is also expected to see above average warmth, but the precip outlook here looks to be average to slightly above average. Ukraine, however, along with most of southern and southeastern Europe, will be dry, as the forecast shows moisture mostly staying further to the north.