BLBG:Wheat, Corn Jump on Speculation Last Week’s Losses May Attract Importers
Wheat and corn futures gained on speculation that last week’s slide to the lowest in more than six months might have attracted importers. Soybeans also climbed.
September-delivery wheat climbed as much as 2.7 percent to $6.29 a bushel on the Chicago Board of Trade, before trading at $6.24 at 10:40 a.m. Singapore time. The contract touched a $5.92 a bushel on July 1, the lowest price for a most-active contract since July 2010. December-delivery corn gained 1.1 percent to $6.03 a bushel. On July 1, the futures traded at $5.755 a bushel, the lowest since December 2010.
Grains plunged last week after the U.S. Department of Agriculture raised its estimates on the nation’s plantings and stockpiles. Markets in the U.S. were closed yesterday for the Independence Day holiday.
“The declines before the holiday in the U.S. were exaggerated,” Tetsu Emori, a commodity fund manager at Astmax Co. said by phone from Tokyo. “The price now should be cheap for buyers.”
U.S. exporters sold 1.14 million metric tons of corn to unknown destinations, the USDA said July 1. The first 360,000 tons are for delivery in the marketing year ending Aug. 31, and the rest is for delivery in the next marketing year, the agency said. The grain may have been bought by China, Grain.gov.cn, a Chinese state researcher said yesterday.
In Ukraine, the wheat harvest will probably be smaller than earlier forecast as rains damaged the crop, Liza Malyshko, an analyst at Kiev-based researcher UkrAgroConsult said yesterday. Ukraine is forecast to be the second-largest wheat exporter in the former Soviet Union, after Russia in the 2011-2012 marketing year, according to the USDA.
Output will probably be between 19.8 million and 20 million tons in 2011, UkrAGroConsult said, lowering a previous forecast for 20.4 million tons. Deputy Agriculture Minister Mykola Bezuhlyi expects about 60 percent of Ukraine’s wheat to be of milling quality, he said on June 22.
Soybeans for November delivery gained as much as 0.9 percent to $13.24 a bushel, before trading at $13.185 a bushel.
To contact the reporter on this story: Luzi Ann Javier in Singapore at ljavier@bloomberg.net.
To contact the editors responsible for this story: James Poole at jpoole4@bloomberg.net;
