TFM Morning Update 03-14-2024

CORN

Corn is lower to start the day, but the trend recently has shown lower prices in the morning before rallying into the end of day. May futures have met resistance at the 45-day moving average.
Today, the USDA will release its export sales report, and the range of trade guesses are between 800k and 1,400k tons with an average guess of 1,015k tons.
The brokerage firm Allendale Inc has estimated that US corn planting will decrease by 1.2% from a year ago at 93.472 million acres. They also estimate that soybean plantings in the US will increase by 2.7%.

Soybeans are higher again this morning with support from both soybean meal and oil. Yesterday, soybean oil was a large driver for soybeans. May soybeans have hit resistance at the 50-day moving average which is around $12.00.
The NOPA crush for February is seen at 178.058 million bushels which would be a record high for the month of February. This number would be down 4.2% from January’s crush but up 7.6% from the previous year.
In Argentina, the states of Cordoba and Buenos Aires are receiving too much rain which could hinder the soybean harvest there. In addition, there have been rumors that the government will implement another round of the soy dollar program to incentivize farmer selling.

All three wheat classes are trading lower this morning under pressure from a string of Chinese cancellations from the US and then yesterday’s rumors that China was cancelling French wheat purchases as well.
Estimates for today’s export sales report in wheat are a range between -200k and 600k tons with an average guess of 335k tons. The Chinese cancellations could result in net cancellations.
IKAR is now estimating Russian wheat exports in 2024/2025 near a record high 50 mmt with the harvest expected at 93 mmt.

Amanda Brill