08/12/2015The U.S. Department of Agriculture likely will trim estimates for domestic corn and soybean production in its monthly supply-and-demand report on Wednesday, reflecting adverse weather in parts of the Farm Belt, according to analysts surveyed by The Wall Street Journal.
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“Production is better than expected because record yields in the western Midwest offset losses in the east from too much rain”, Don Roose, the president of U.S. Commodities Inc.in West Des Moines, Iowa, said in a telephone interview. Forecast U.S. soybean exports are lowered by 50 million bushels to 1.725 billion, as a result of slow export sales commitments.
Soybean production was expected to hit 3.92 billion bushels on 46.9 bushels per acre.
Damaged crops from rain-flooded fields in June and July led the federal government Wednesday (Aug. 12) to project big drops in the amount of corn and soybeans Indiana farmers will harvest compared with last year’s bounty. Globally, ending stocks for corn are projected up 5 million metric tons, up 1.7 million metric tons for wheat, but dipped down 5 million metric tons for soybeans. As of August. 2, 70 percent of U.S. corn was reported to be in good or excellent condition, three percentage points below the same time past year. New-crop imports went up 5 million to 30 million bushels, while Feed and residual added another 25 million to 5.3 billion bushels. The fall in price has been recorded as ‘the biggest price drop in nine months’ with prices at a low of $3.7625 a bushel. “But the yields USDA found aren’t far from those suggested by our yield models based on the nationwide crop ratings”, said Bryce Knorr, Farm Futures senior grain market analyst. However, it raised its yield estimate 2 bushels to 168.8 bushels per acre, when the trade was looking for a similar decline. That is especially true for the soybean crop, which undergoes its critical growth stage later in the season than corn.
The government cut by 900,000 acres its estimate for harvested soybean area, thanks largely to lower acreage in Missouri. It had lowered its outlook for 2015/16 soy ending stocks in the previous two monthly reports.
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September Chicago corn futures fell 16 cents a bushel following the crop production report’s release.
