Good morning. Grain markets are mostly quietly lower this morning to start the new week while the soy complex is trading mixed as weekend geopolitical news in the Middle East has, at least so far, not had a lot of impact on the CBOT. And for the most part, outside markets have also taken the news mostly in stride and are relatively quiet this morning as well. As far as the ag space goes today, and more generally for the rest of the week, it will likely be another five days of choppy, technical trade, as the USDA's June acreage and quarterly stocks reports loom just a week from today and the funds and weather continue to otherwise dominate price direction. Corn futures to start Monday morning are trading 2-4 cents lower, soybean futures are trading 1-2 cents lower, and the Chicago wheat market is trading unchanged to a penny lower. Products are mixed, soybean meal is down around $2/ton, and soybean oil is up 40-50 points. Outside markets are mixed to start the week, crude oil futures are up 50-600 cents/bbl but some $3-4 off the highs made last night, the Dow Jones index is down 120 points, and the US$ index is up 60-70 points; the S&P500 is down 10 points and the NASDAQ is down 50 points.

Today's Reports: Weekly Export Inspections; CFTC Commitment of Traders; Weekly Crop Progress

• Like we mentioned at the top, the major headline maker from the over the weekend didn't have to do with corn or soybeans, as the US military struck three Iranian nuclear facilities at Fordow, Natanz, and Isfahan with bombs and missiles. Trump touted the operation as a major success, while the response from the Iranian side has been rather muted to this point, though they did vow retaliation.

• As far as the markets go, crude oil initially spiked higher on the open last night as algorithm traders ran with the headlines, but has since fallen back towards unchanged this morning as it appears, despite some erroneous social media posts through the day yesterday, that the Strait of Hormuz, which some ~20% of the world's oil passes through, is still operating at least in some capacity. Traders will be paying close to attention to whether this changes in any way early this week, and will also be watching for any additional response from Iran, who has so far mostly downplayed the attacks.

• The USDA's Cattle on Feed report for the month of June, released after the markets closed on Friday, showed the US feedlot herd as of June 1 at 11.442 mil head, which was down just over 1% from last year; placements in the month were seen at 1.886 mil head, down nearly 8% from last year, while marketings in the month were seen at 1.758 mil head, which was down just over 10% from last year. All three numbers were close to trade expectations. To view the full report, please click here.

• Oil traders in India, who is the world's largest veg oil importer, say that the country's soybean oil imports in the month of June could fall by nearly 20% from May's level due to port congestion at a key import hub that will likely lead to some vessels originally scheduled to unload in June, being unloaded in July. Palm oil shipments are not expected to be affected due to the fact that other ports handle most of the imports and are not expected to be hit with the delays.

• The executive director for Capeco, who is a private grain and oilseed export group in Paraguay, said recently in a statement that he thinks the country's soybean harvest this year totaled around 10 MMT's, which was a "reasonable" crop but still down from last year's roughly 11 MMT harvest. He also said his group expects the country's corn harvest to total 5 MMTs, which would be up from last year's decade-low production figure of 3.2 MMT's.

• According to the USDA, federally inspected US beef production in the week ending June 21st totaled 480 mil lbs, which was down 1% from last week; pork production in the week at 509 mil lbs was down just 0.5% on the week. For the year, total US beef production is down 3.2% from last year, and pork production is down 1.7%.

• French farm body FranceAgirMer said that the country's soft wheat crop was rated 68% in the G/EX category as of early last week, which compares to 70% the week prior and 62% during the same week last year. Warm/dry weather over the past week, as well as forecasts for this pattern to largely continue through this week, means conditions are likely to further slide in the next update.

• As a reminder, markets will see both CFTC commitment of traders data and weekly crop progress data after the close today, as last week's holiday pushed the CFTC data back into this week; traders expect crop progress to show similar to maybe slightly better conditions to last week in the corn and soybean ratings, while funds likely had a quiet week in the soy space, while continuing to add to corn shorts and covering some shorts in the wheat market.

• Financial markets look to have most of their focus on the Iran situation for Monday, as the data slate is otherwise light to start the new week. Federal Reserve chairman Jerome Powell is set to testify before a House panel on Tuesday following last week's unchanged interest rate decision, while updated monthly inflation data is then on the docket for later in the week on Thursday/Friday.

• Satellite-based rainfall data from over the weekend (pictured below) shows high pressure ridging has pretty clearly settled in to the southeastern US, with areas east of the Mississippi and south of I-80 generally seeing little to no precip over the past 72 hours. To the north, parts of N MN and ND saw totals of 1-2", which were accompanied by strong storms and tornadoes in SE ND specifically, while more scattered systems brought similar totals to localized parts of SD, NE, and IA. Of note, there were 17 tornado reports in ND Friday according to the Storm Prediction Center.

• For this week, severe weather threats look to remain in place for these same areas in the northern/northwestern Midwest that saw storms over the weekend, as ridge-riding convection will continue to keep the possibility for severe weather elevated most of this week and into the weekend. The EU model seems to see the best/heaviest precip chances towards the back half of the week on Wednesday/Thursday, with total precip for the week through NE/IA/MN/WI seen in a range of 2-4".

• High pressure will also keep the Midwest hot this week, as forecasts show highs in the mid/upper 90's remaining in place for the bulk of the Midwest through the week and into the weekend, before slightly more seasonal air is expected next week. 10-15 day temperature maps though continue to show most all of the US with above average warmth, which has been the forecast outlook for weeks now.

• Not going to talk a lot about week two precip this morning, as there continues to be rather notable model disagreement in the period and our confidence in the forecast beyond the next 5-7 days remains low; the EU's outlook is wetter in the south/southeast but drier through the Midwest than was seen last week for July 1-7, while the GFS sees average to above average precip continuing to linger through most of the eastern US in the period.