SINGAPORE: Prices for Chicago soybean futures rose for the first time in three sessions on Thursday, but gains are likely to be restrained by expectations of higher interest rates and the harvest of a record Brazilian crop.
After falling to its lowest level in nearly a week earlier in the session, wheat held up, while corn fell. A trader based in Singapore stated, “As the Brazilian harvest picks up pace, the soybean market is going to be abundantly supplied over the next several months.”
The most active soybean contract on the Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT) gained 1% to $15.27 per bushel.
Wheat rose by 0.3 percent to $7.82 per bushel, while corn fell by 0.1 percent to $6.75 per bushel. Monday, agribusiness consulting firm AgRural reported that the harvest of Brazilian soybeans had reached a completion rate of 17%.
Meanwhile, Scoville noted that progress was further along in Mato Grosso, Brazil’s largest soybean state.
The agricultural markets were impacted by a stronger dollar, which made greenback-priced commodities more expensive for buyers holding other currencies.
The case that the Federal Reserve still has a long way to go in tightening rates was bolstered by robust retail sales data from the United States, which supported the resilience of the largest economy in the world. Losses on the markets for wheat and corn were reduced as a result of uncertainty regarding the threats posed by the war in Ukraine to grain supplies in the Black Sea.
Ukraine appealed to the United Nations and Turkey on Wednesday to press Russia to immediately stop preventing Ukrainian grain shipments, which supply millions of people, and to refrain from using the food as a weapon.
On Wednesday, the farm office FranceAgriMer made a sharp upward revision to its barley export forecast following a wave of shipments to China, despite lowering its outlook for French soft wheat exports this season due to competition from supplies from the Black Sea.
According to data released on Wednesday by the National Oilseed Processors Association (NOPA), the US soybean crush increased for the first time in three months and soyoil stocks increased for a fourth straight month. However, both gains were smaller than anticipated.
Last month, NOPA members crushed 179.007 million bushels of soybeans, up 0.8% from the 177.505 million bushels processed in December but down 1.8% from the crush of 182.216 million bushels in January 2022. NOPA members process approximately 95% of all soybeans processed in the United States.
On Wednesday, traders reported that commodity funds were net buyers of soyoil futures and net sellers of CBOT wheat, corn, soybean, and soymeal futures contracts.
