New York | Reuters — Wheat futures on the Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT) rose for a second straight session on Wednesday, as Russia reported Ukrainian strikes on a naval base in the grain-rich Black Sea region and Kyiv said its grain exports dropped sharply.
Kyiv said on Wednesday more than 100 of its port facilities had been damaged by Russian bombardment and its grain exports were down sharply since Moscow withdrew from a wartime grain shipping deal. Meanwhile, Ukraine claimed its forces successfully struck Russian warships in Crimea.
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Mark Schultz, the chief analyst with NorthStar in Minneapolis, told Reuters that anything that might further snarl grain exports in the region would support prices.
“If you can slow the export out of Russia, you have a friendlier factor,” he said.
The benchmark December wheat contract climbed 1.66 per cent to settle at $5.97-1/4 per bushel (all figures US$).
Corn futures followed wheat higher in a rebound from recent multi-year lows, with December futures up 1.2 per cent at $4.82-1/4 a bushel.
“Wheat going up will probably give support for corn,” Schultz said. But gains were capped by stiff export market competition from a record Brazilian crop and USDA’s forecast on Tuesday of a larger-than-expected U.S. harvest.
Soybean futures also eked out gains after dropping in early trading. The oilseeds remain near three-month lows, but some traders said they expected crop yields from the coming harvest to come in below recent estimates from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA).
“I think the USDA is really going to lower its yield estimates once they start counting crop,” said Jack Scoville, vice president at the Price Futures Group in Chicago.
The highest-volume CBOT soybean contract rose 0.2 per cent, settling at $13.49-3/4 per bushel.
— Reporting for Reuters by Zachary Goelman in New York.
