Week Beginning Monday 19th March 2018

• The London LIFFE wheat future for May 2018 is lower this morning from Friday’s position at £144.10/T. This is £0.65/T lower than the opening trade a week previous.
• The London LIFFE wheat future for November 2018 is lower from Friday’s position at £144.60/T. This is just £1.15/T lower than last week’s opening trade.
• The London LIFFE wheat future for November 2019 is also lower this morning at £145.5/T. This is £1.35/T lower than the week previous.

Current values for feed wheat are struggling to maintain £150/T ex-farm for April with the March position being full. Further forward, consumers are examining the availability of imported wheat, which with a strengthening pound is available delivered the UK feed mill at similar money to April delivered for domestic supplies – please speak with the office to discuss your requirements.

OSR values are down again this morning following another volatile week. Spot collection is this morning valued at £285/T Ex-farm – This is down £4/T on Friday’s price.

New crop trade is limited but appears to be following LIFFE future values up and down.

The drought has set to continue in the Argentina. The Argentina’s soyabean crop is now pegged at just 40Mt by the Rosario Grain Exchange, this is a 6.5Mt below its previous (February) estimate and an even further 17Mt lower than last year’s soyabean crop. Yet again, Argentine rains have proved not all they were cracked up to be, the long- awaited rain event for Argentina that was expected to stabilise the soyabean crop production has disappointed. With no significant improvement in crop yields the reliance increases on the Brazilian and US supplies to meet global demand for both maize and soyabean crops. However, for corn, Adecoagro said that it’s early seeded crop, planted in September -to-December, ‘Grew under good conditions and was much less affected by the lack of rain’ and the that ‘the soil humidity was adequate during the development of the crops’”. Nonetheless, the late planted corn areas are still exposed to the dry conditions and still need to see some rain over the next few weeks.

Achieving the £300/T Ex-farm is still looking to be an ambitious target in the short-term, according to Agrimoney. However, the Argentina crop is now rated with 50% in either a “good or excellent” condition, down another two points on the week compared to over 80% for the same time last year.

In the UK, rapeseed prices continue to track Continental prices lower, adjusted for currency, a rise in the strength of the pound against both the US dollar and euro is part of the reason behind the more muted gains in the UK delivered rapeseed prices.

The trade keeps a close eye on the USA drought spreading across most of the Plains. However, the world’s larger importers no longer rely solely on the USA as major wheat exporter – we will therefore need to see adverse conditions persist in Europe and the Black Sea to see a lasting rally to ex-farm prices.

Currently, European export values have dipped, meaning that they are now more competitive versus Black Sea Prices.

Russia is forecasted to have another very cold front that is creeping westwards into Europe in late March which could see potential crop damage in immature plants. However, Romania, Poland and Germany are the most exposed, but all would feel the impact through prices. This is worth keeping an eye on over the next few months…