AM Comments April 14 2025
Good morning. Following the strong close to the week last week at the CBOT, prices in the ag space are taking a bit of a breather to start Monday, with all three of corn, beans and wheat having spent most of the overnight session chopping around either side of unchanged. From a fundamental standpoint, planting progress and weather will begin to become more talked about in the coming days/weeks, while the ongoing trade/tariff saga will continue to provide headline risk that will simply be near-impossible to predict. Otherwise, this week looks to be similarly choppy to last week, with managed money still near neutral and a lot of the intraday price activity being dominated by computer/algorithm traders. Corn futures to start the week are trading either side of unchanged, soybean futures are also trading either side of unchanged, and the Chicago wheat market is trading 6-8 cents lower. Products are lower, soybean meal is down $1-2/ton, and soybean oil is down 30-40 points. Outside markets are mixed to start the week, crude oil futures are up around $1/bbl, the Dow Jones index is up 460 points, and the US$ index is down 30-40 points. The S&P500 is up 90 points and the NASDAQ is up 370 points; all three of the stock index futures had gap-higher starts to start trading last night. Gold futures are quietly lower but are still near contract highs made Friday.
Today's Reports: Weekly Export Inspections; Weekly Crop Progress
- Friday afternoon's CFTC report showed that as of Tuesday, April 8th, managed money traders were net-long 53,448 contracts of corn (-3,180 on the week), net-short 50,447 contracts of soybeans (-20,600 on the week), and net-short 102,132 contracts of Chicago wheat (+9,909 on the week). In soy products, funds are now net-short 97,630 contracts of meal (+3,102) and are net-long 30,125 contracts of oil (+35,887).
- NOPA will release updated monthly soybean crush and bean oil stocks figures tomorrow morning for the month of March; the report is expected to show soybean crush at 197.602 mil bu's, which would be a new record for the month and up nearly 11% from February's figure. Bean oil stocks are seen at 1.617 bil lbs, which would be up 8% from the Feb figure but still down more than 12% from March of last year.
- Chinese customs data released over the weekend for the month of March showed soybean imports from all destinations in the month at a 17-year low of just 3.5 mmt's, which was down more than 35% from last year. Sources say the new trade war with President Trump and also harvest delays out of Brazil were the main reasons for the lower pace. Cumulative exports through the first three months of the year have reached 17.11 mmt's, which is down nearly 8% from last year.
- US federally inspected beef production in the week ending April 12th fell to 491 mil lbs according to data from the USDA, which was down just over 4% from the week prior. Pork production was down just 1% at 540 mil lbs. For the year so far, beef production is down 1.7% from last year, while pork production is down 2.6%.
- Global crop conditions will continue seeing more and more attention in the weeks ahead; over the weekend, French wheat conditions were pegged at 75% g/ex (+11% from last year), while Russia's winter grain crops were seen as 93% in normal conditions. USDA will release updated US wheat figures, as well as corn and soybean planting estimates, later this afternoon.
- The US$ index is trading near six-month lows this morning as traders continue to have concern that confusion and uncertainty surrounding President Trump's tariffs will further drive investment away from the US. Over the weekend, Trump said that there would be 'potential flexibility' with some companies in the semiconductor sector regarding tariffs on these goods, but otherwise, details were again scarce with most assuming further comments will be made early this week.
- Sources familiar with the matter have indicated that weekend talks between the US and Iran were "positive" and "constructive", and have led to additional talks being scheduled to take place this week regarding the Middle Eastern nation's nuclear program. Trump threatened military action if no deal was able to be reached, but Iran's foreign minister had a more positive tone when speaking to reporters, saying "I think we are very close to a basis for negotiations."
- US weather forecasts have trended back wetter over the weekend, and have added a significant rain event for parts of northeast TX and further into the mid-south for next weekend/early next week, while the rest of the central Cron Belt is also expected to see 0.5-2" of rain in the same period. Week two forecasts are also wetter than was seen on Friday, and show most of the eastern 2/3's of the US with above average precip chances into the last week of April. Short-term, just light precip is expected through the first half of this week, before rains fill back in Thursday/Friday and into the weekend.
- Temperature forecasts see some cooler air continuing to linger in the upper Plains for the first part of this week, before ridging expands east and allows most of the country to see above average temperatures by the end of the week. Both the 5-10 and 10-15 day maps show pockets of intermittent cooler air through the West Coast, but overall the pattern looks to keep things mostly above average into the end of the month.
- Weather forecasts in South America look to be nearly ideal over the next week to 10 days, with models over the weekend trending drier in Argentina (good for harvest progress) and wetter in Brazil (good for safrinha corn). Temperature forecasts for Brazil have also begun showing signs of a cooler shift in the south, which would also be beneficial for the developing second corn crop. 10-15 day outlooks also show mostly the same outlooks, but these will need to be monitored this week amid a shift over the weekend.