|
It sounds like the weather for the next week or so will be more seasonally. Showers and temps in the 40’s are on the horizon. Some field work did get completed last week. More to the south and west of our trade territory. Around here a little NH3 was applied. Some producers even had a chance to get some seed corn ends seeded down. Would expect things to pickup in 2 weeks. The USDA will release their guess on the number of corn and bean acres that are intended to get planted this year at 11:00 am Friday March 31st. The average trade guess for corn acres is around 90 million. The bean acres guess north of 88 million. Weather will play the most important roll heading into our planting and growing season. The future markets have not traded limit up or down for 3 years but did the previous 3 years. With the sell off on the board comes some improvements in basis. Both corn and bean basis values have walked in since the beginning of the year. There is plenty of board carry for hedgers to roll their future positions forward and buying some more time for basis to improve. There are plenty of corn and bean bushels around the country. Processors will have to improve their bids to keep crushing and grinding. River values have also gotten a little softer for the summer and fall. We have not heard of any issues with the SA growing and harvesting seasons. Only news has been how big will their bean crop get? I heard today some Brazilian corn may be headed to Mexico and South Africa may have gotten some corn business done with some Asian countries. We have opened up the free price later program for beans. The corn program opened up late last month. Pricing due date will be August 31, 2017 for both commodities. The Cedar Rapids bean plants yearly maintenance shut down should be completed early next week. The east bean dump should be ready to start taking beans on Monday April 3rd. Iowa Falls will shut off their bean receiving and meal load Friday April 7th. Both operations will be closed until the first of May. Have a safe spring planting season! Bob |
