Profit taking helped to send Chicago crop futures to losses on Thursday.
Wheat suffered some of the deepest losses as traders took money off the table following strong gains a day earlier linked to rising geopolitical tensions. Forecasts for at least some rain in parts of the drought-plagued Black Sea region added to the downside. On the other hand, the USDA’s weekly export sales report this morning showed bookings of US wheat for the week ended Sept. 26 at 443,697 tonnes, above the high end of trade expectations. December Chicago wheat lost 11 ¾ cents to $6.03 ½, December Kansas City was down 7 3/43 cents at $6.11 ½, and December Minneapolis dropped 2 ¾ cents to $6.46 ¼.
Profit taking pressured corn as well, even as the weekly export sales report was considered positive for prices. The report showed a total of 1.684 million tonnes of corn booked in the week ended Sep. 26. That was above the top end of the trade estimates and the largest in the 4 weeks of the marketing year so far. December lost 4 ¼ cents to $4.28 ¼, and March slipped 4 cents to $4.46.
Soybeans reportedly saw some pressure from a possible delay of new EU regulations which would ban the import of commodities taken from land deforested after December 2020. In theory, the regulation could limit beans from Brazil in favour of countries like the US. The export sales report tallied a total of 1.44 million tonnes of US soybeans booked in the week ended Sep. 26, at the high end of trade guesses. November beans lost a dime to $10.46, and January was down 9 ¾ cents at $10.64 ½.
