Chicago | Reuters — U.S. wheat futures fell more than two per cent on Wednesday and corn and soybeans followed the trend lower, pressured by a stronger U.S. dollar and fears of more interest rate hikes by the Federal Reserve, analysts said.
Fundamental news for grains and oilseeds was thin, leaving markets stuck within recent trading ranges.
“Today is all about negative money flow due to this week’s data showing a stronger-than-expected economy with sticky inflation,” StoneX chief commodities economist Arlan Suderman wrote in a client note.
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Chicago Board of Trade March wheat settled down 16-3/4 cents at $7.69-1/4 per bushel, retreating from a six-week high set a day earlier at $7.97-1/2 (all figures US$). Traders noted psychological resistance at the $8/bu. mark. The March wheat contract has not traded above $8 since late November.
“It gets close to $8 and it stalls out. Soft red (winter) wheat is getting adequate moisture, but western Kansas is a struggle. Supplies are big enough in the world, (so) it’s a trading range market in a lot of these grains,” said Don Roose, president of Iowa-based U.S. Commodities.
Uncertainty about risks to Black Sea grain supplies from the war in Ukraine underpinned the wheat and corn markets, Roose noted.
March corn finished down six cents at $6.76-1/4 a bushel and March soybeans ended down 11-3/4 cents at $15.25-3/4 a bushel.
Corn and soy were pressured as crude oil futures sagged in response to a bigger-than-expected U.S. weekly crude stock build, although crude later pared losses. Corn sometimes follows trends in crude oil due to its role as the main U.S. feedstock for ethanol fuel, while soyoil is used to make biodiesel.
Soybeans have eased on profit-taking since the March contract rose to its highest level since June on Monday, driven by a near nine-year top for soymeal as drought persisted in Argentina. Traders have shifted their focus in recent days to the advancing harvest of a likely record-large soybean crop in Brazil.
Meanwhile, the National Oilseed Processors Association (NOPA) said its U.S. members crushed 179 million bushels of soybeans in January, up 0.8 per cent from December but down 1.8 per cent from the year-ago January 2022 crush. The figure also fell below an average of trade estimates for 181.656 million bushels.
— Reporting for Reuters by Julie Ingwersen in Chicago; additional reporting by Gus Trompiz in Paris and Naveen Thukral in Singapore.
