Chicago | Reuters—Chicago Board of Trade soybean futures turned higher on Thursday as the U.S. dollar weakened, while corn dipped to the lowest in more than three weeks on expectations of increased planting by U.S. farmers this year.
Meanwhile, the soybean oil market rallied – and gave a boost to soybean futures – after Reuters reported that U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration has asked oil and biofuels producers to hash out a deal on the next phase of the nation’s biofuels policy to avoid the kind of political clashes that marked his first term.
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And CBOT’s soft-red winter wheat nearby contracts slumped to new contract lows, under pressure from forecasts of rain in the U.S. and Russian wheat belt, sluggish U.S. wheat export sales and an agreement to implement a ceasefire in the Black Sea, market analysts said.
The most-active CBOT wheat Wv1 settled down 3-1/4 cents at $5.32 a bushel, after touching its lowest since January 10.
Corn Cv1 settled down 1-1/2 cents at $4.50, having earlier dropped to its lowest since March 4. And soybeans Sv1 settled up 15-3/4 cents to $10.16-3/4 per bushel, after earlier touching the highest price since March 18.
Grain markets were looking ahead to Monday’s U.S. planting and stocks data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, as well as seeking greater clarity on broad tariffs promised by U.S. President Donald Trump from April 2.
“The elephant in the room is that report, because the trade is going into it with a fear that we will see record corn acres,” said Don Roose, president of U.S. Commodities in West Des Moines, Iowa. “So you’re seeing some fund liquidation of corn, and fund short-covering of soybeans.”
U.S. farmers will plant 94.361 million acres with corn this year, up from 90.594 million in 2024, according to an average of analysts polled by Reuters before the USDA report.
—Additional reporting by Gus Trompiz in Paris and Naveen Thukral in Singapore
