SINGAPORE, May 29: Chicago corn rose for a fifth straight session on Wednesday to trade near its highest in four weeks, underpinned by forecasts of more rain in the U.S. Grain belt which is likely to further delay planting.
Wheat remained under pressure, though, with the U.S. rains adding to the bearish sentiment in the market following favourable weather in Australia and the Black Sea region.
U.S. Farmers slowed their planting pace during the past week due to rainy conditions that delayed the tail end of corn seeding and pushed soybean planting to its slowest in 17 years, the U.S. Department of Agriculture said in its weekly crop progress report.
‘The risk is that with flooding in some of the Midwest areas they can lose significant number of corn acres,’ said Paul Deane, agricultural commodity strategist at ANZ in Melbourne.
‘I think this market has got a bit more to play out. We will see corn rally over the next week or so before it is all said and done.’
The USDA said that corn planting was 86 percent complete as of May 26, up 15 percentage points from a week earlier. The corn progress was down from 99 percent a year ago and behind the five-year average of 90 percent.
Farmers had finished 44 percent of their soybean planting as of May 26, compared with 87 percent a year ago and the five-year average of 61 percent.
Chicago Board of Trade new-crop December corn rose 0.3 percent to $5.52-1/2 a bushel, not far from Tuesday’s peak of $5.54-1/4, its highest since May 3.
New-crop November soybeans slid 0.1 percent to $12 86-1/2 a bushel after climbing to its highest since February 22 in the last session.
July wheat was little changed at $6.94-1/4 a bushel.
The same rains that slow the corn and soybean planting are coming at a favourable time for the winter wheat harvest and pressuring prices.
John Dee, a meteorologist for Global Weather Monitoring, said 1.0 to 3.0 inches (2.5 cm to 7.6 cm) or more of rain fell over the weekend in the central Midwest, and 0.5 inch to 1.5 inches is expected at midweek in the northern Midwest.
Corn planted after mid-May typically has lower yields due to delayed pollination.
The soybean market slid from its highest since late February but investors are keeping a close watch on shipments from Brazil which are again getting delayed.
A new ordinance that prohibits trucks from parking at Brazil’s main Santos port at night caused what may be the worst traffic jam of a busy season on Tuesday, slowing delivery of the country’s record soybean crop.
Lines of parked trucks extended as much as 50 kilometres (31 miles) on the Anchieta highway leading to the Santos coast, according to highway operator EcoVias.
Commodity funds bought a net 12,000 CBOT corn contracts on Tuesday, trade sources said. They sold 3,000 wheat and bought 13,000 soybean.
(agencies)
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