Wheat at 1-week high on Ukrainian export woes, soybeans firm

Chicago wheat futures rose for a second straight session on Tuesday, fuelled by concerns over exports from the Black Sea region after a weekend attack temporarily shut down a key Ukrainian port, disrupting grain shipments.

Soybeans edged up after closing lower on Monday, although rains in Argentina and forecasts of wet weather in Brazil limited the losses.

FUNDAMENTALS

The most-active wheat contract on the Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT) Wv1 was up 0.6% at $7.59 a bushel, as of 0115 GMT, after climbing to its highest since 5 Dec at $7.60 earlier in the session.

Soybeans Sv1 rose 0.2% to $14.62-3/4 a bushel, having lost 1.6% on Monday, and corn Cv1 climbed 0.1% to $6.54-1/2 a bushel, extending gains.

News that the Ukrainian port of Odesa suspended operations on Sunday after Russian strikes on energy supply put attention back on risks to wartime grain shipments. The port resumed activity on Monday.

Soybeans are being underpinned by strong US exports to China, the world's biggest buyer of the oilseed. But investor sentiment cooled as China faced an upturn in infections while it rolls back Covid-19 restrictions.

In South America, part of Argentina's drought-hit farm belt received significant rainfall over the weekend.

The sowing of Brazil's 2022/23 soybean crop has reached 95% of the estimated area, slightly below last year's level of 96%, agribusiness consultancy AgRural said on Monday, as producers hope for rains to secure good yields.

Growers are still alert about the poor distribution of rainfall, though no severe losses have been registered so far and forecasts point to showers covering much of the country in the coming days, AgRural said.

The US Agriculture Department said that export inspections of wheat totalled 218,460 tonnes and export inspections of corn totalled 505,104 tonnes in the week ended Dec. 8.

Soybean export inspections totalled 1.840 million tonnes. That was down from 2.080 million a week earlier and in line with trade forecasts.

China's 2022 soybean crop jumped almost 24%, while corn and wheat output also saw small increases, official data showed on Monday. Soybean output rose 23.7% to 20.3 million tonnes, as the acreage planted with the oilseed jumped 21.7%.

Commodity funds were net buyers of CBOT wheat, corn and soyoil futures contracts on Monday, traders said. The funds were net sellers of soybean and soymeal futures. 

MARKET NEWS

Wall Street stocks, oil prices and US Treasury yields all rose on Monday as investors took an optimistic stance ahead of the last round of transatlantic central bank interest rate hikes this year, hoping that the now-hefty pace of increases in borrowing costs will finally slow.