ACG

 

 

ALL LOCATIONS CLOSED

MONDAY, FEB. 17

FOR PRESIDENTS' DAY

 

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Monday - Friday

7 a.m. to 4 p.m.

 

 

2.11.25

 

Good afternoon. Choppy trade has become the norm at the CBOT of late, and Monday's action was no different as corn and soybeans each spent a majority of the day's session within spitting distance of unchanged to start the new week. Tomorrow's supply and demand update from the USDA is not expected to be overly Earth-shattering, but it was clear today nonetheless that traders were content to wait for its arrival, which led to limited market action in the meantime.

 

CH closed Monday at 4.91 1/2, up 4 cents. CK was up 4 cents also at 5.04 1/2. SH was unchanged on the day at 10.49 1/2. SK also closed unchanged at 10.65 1/2. WH was down 3 and 1/4 at 5.79 1/2. Products were lower, March soybean meal closed at 300.50, down 90 cents/ton, and March soybean oil closed at 45.73, down 25 points. Inside day for bean oil. Livestock markets were mixed to start the week, April live cattle closed at 198.12, up $1.35, March feeders closed at 268.12, up $3.22, and April hogs closed at 91.62, down 52 cents. Outside day lower for hogs. Outside markets are mostly higher, crude oil futures are up $1.40-1.50/bbl, the Dow Jones index is up 150 points, and the US$ index is up 25-30 points. The S&P500 is up 40 points and the NASDAQ is up 250 points. Gold futures made new contract highs and also had new contract high settlements, while coffee futures rallied another 6+% and also set new contract highs and new high settlements.

 

Spreads were mixed/quiet to start the week, corn spreads were down a penny and 3/4 to up a penny, and soybean spreads were down a half cent to up 3/4 of a cent. CH/CK closed at -13, unchanged on the day, and SH/SK was also unchanged at -16. SH/SK made new contract lows at -17. SK/SN matched its contract low made Friday at -15 3/4.

 

USDA this morning announced additional corn sales to Mexico, similar to those announced last week; private exporters reported sales of 365,000 mt's of corn, but instead of the 2025/26 crop year like last week, this sale was for delivery during the 2024/25 crop year.

 

Other demand news to kick off the week included the regular weekly export inspection report, which showed a fairly steady week of grain export business in the week ending February 6th. Corn inspections in the week totaled 1.334 mmt's, which was up 6.5% from the week prior and was the fifth largest volume of this marketing year. Soybean inspections totaled 1.042 mmt's, which was down 8.6% from last week but still more than 40% higher than the low-water mark for 2025 so far made two weeks ago. And wheat inspections in the week were seen at 536k mt's, which was up nearly 112% from last week and was the highest weekly volume since the week of September 30th last year.

 

Otherwise, news was largely limited in the ag space on Monday as it seemed like we mentioned at the top, most of the trade was taking a wait and see approach to tomorrow morning's USDA data, and as there were also no new developments on tariffs or trade policy throughout the day. The retaliatory tariffs discussed at the end of last week will continue to linger in the background until more details are given, but there are few today who are exactly sure of what countries and also what specific products will be included in this next round of policy. Circling back to tomorrow's WASDE report, adjustments that could produce market excitement sit mostly on the corn side; should the USDA continue to further raise demand, in either the export or ethanol category, and drop carryout below the 1.5 bil bu mark, this could possibly produce a bit of excitement. But with future trade policy remaining uncertain, we don't view an increase in exports as overly justified at this time, even as pace has remained good through the first six weeks of 2025. We would also mention that while 1.5 bil bu's is significantly tighter than the 2+ bil estimate seen through most of fall, it remains comfortably above levels seen from 2020 through 2022, and also above levels seen in 2010/11/12/13. As far as the supply side goes, this will be a mostly global report as there will be no new crop US numbers until May and the January report more or less finalized numbers on the old crop side.

 

Checking in on Brazil, the story remains largely unchanged from last week as farmers here continue to try and play catch up on soybean harvest that has been delayed by about 10-15 days for most growers. Though it is bean harvest that is behind, the situation continues to be more of a factor for the corn market than anything else, as further stalled progress only puts into question the amount of corn acres that can get planted, not whether the soybeans will come off. As far as the beans go, they will get cut and, according to several sources in the area, there will be a lot of them. We've talked about this in the past, but remember that the problem with planting corn beyond the end of February in Brazil is not one of enough moisture to get it out of the ground, but rather the fact that this would then push pollination into the back half of April which presents significant moisture risks in most years. As it stands today, we would see soybean production estimates having a considerably lower amount of uncertainty than corn production estimates, which depending on weather between now and May, could still see significant adjustments.

 

Continuing on the topic of weather, forecasts for South America were once again little changed at mid-day today, with the models still showing a shift to better moisture in northern Argentina and southern Brazil beyond mid-week, while the rest of central Brazil into the northeast will see a shift to drier conditions that should allow for better field work in the weeks ahead. Week-two forecasts are echoing this change, which has kept our confidence in its solution fairly high. The warmest temps over the next week look to remain centered mostly in southern Brazil and northern Argentina, though eastern Brazil also looks to see slightly warmer than normal conditions over the next week. On the margin, forecasts today see significantly fewer risks for the whole of the area than they did two weeks ago.

 

We are going to stay a little more short term with our US forecasts this week, as the presence of several storm systems over the next 10 days have produced significant run-to-run volatility between the models, which has lowered our confidence beyond a few days. Generally speaking, the systems all follow a relatively similar pattern of spawning on the eastern side of the Rocky Mountains and then pushing east across the Midwest and then out to the East Coast or up through the northeast. The first of these systems will start tonight/early tomorrow in the southern Midwest, and provide a band of potentially heavy snow to an area from southeast Missouri through Kentucky and into West Virginia. System number 2 then appears to move through a little further north, starting in Kansas and working through Missouri and Illinois and then into northern Indiana and Michigan Wednesday into Thursday. Further to the south, most of the southeast expects to receive anywhere from 0.5-2" of rainfall, with some local flood risks possible. Temperatures will continue to drop off throughout the week, with Wednesday/Thursday appearing to be the coldest days for the largest amount of area.


Quotes are delayed, as of February 11, 2025, 08:54:59 AM CST or prior.

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