March canola touched $649.90 per tonne early Friday but couldn’t break through resistance at $650 and closed down, pressured by profit taking, technical weakness in soybeans and new forecasts for rain in Argentina.

Early strength came from good Chinese demand for U.S. soybeans and a strike at Brazil’s ports.

Watch Twitter @westernproducer and Producer.com Monday for our coverage of Grain World in Winnipeg.

March canola closed Friday at $632.00, down $11.40. May closed at $621.40, down $10.30 and new crop November was $563.60, down $8.20.

For the week, March rose $1.80 and November rose $7.80.

March soybeans topped the technical resistance of $15 per bushel in the morning, but couldn’t hold there and dropped back into the high $14s.

Pressure came when forecasts shifted to a wetter trend in dry Argentina and southern Brazil.

• Early strength came from China buying American soybeans because it is worried about Brazil’s ability to export. Some of the deals were a switch from Brazil source to U.S. source.

Brazil port workers struck for six hours today, but called off a strike on Tuesday. They still might take action in March over job security issues as Brazil privatizes and modernizes its ports.

Soyoil was pressured by unconfirmed talk that China might release rape oil from reserves, Reuters reported.

• The Canadian Oilseed Processors Association said members crushed 130,645 tonnes of canola in the week ending Feb. 20, down 6.6 percent from the week before. That represented a capacity use of about 79 percent, down from the average to date of 88 percent.

• USDA today forecast American soybean seedings will climb slightly to 77.5 million acres. With 76.6 million harvested acres and an average yield of 44.5 bushels an acre, recovering from 39.6 bu. last year, it sees production of 3.405 billion bu., an increase of almost 13 percent.

It sees domestic crush climbing almost three percent to 1.66 billion bu. and exports climbing 11.5 percent to 1.5 billion bu.

Total use climbs about seven percent.

Ending stocks double to 250 million bu., creating a stocks-to-use ratio of 7.6 percent, far more comfortable than the rock bottom 4.1 percent at the end of the current crop year.

It predicts a crop year average price of $10.50 a bu., down 26.6 percent from $14.30 in the current crop year.

• The heavy snow that fell across the U.S. hard red winter wheat belt and into the western Midwest in the last couple of days kept downward pressure on wheat and corn. More snow is expected Sunday.

The USDA said weekly export sales of wheat were 755,900 tonnes, up from 706,300 tonnes a week ago and topping expectations for 400,000 to 600,000 tonnes.

• Agriculture Canada has adjusted its supply and demand outlook to account for the Statistics Canada Dec. 31 stocks report that showed pulse producers had sold a lot of their production to livestock feeders.

Agriculture Canada’s new 2012-13 ending stocks numbers are lower, but still not as low as some private forecasters.

The department lowered the pea stocks number for 2012-13 to 200,000 tonnes, down from 300,000 in January.

It sees pea stocks at the end of 2013-14 at 300,000 tonnes, down from 390,000 in the January report.

Lentil stocks at the end of the current crop year are pegged at 450,000 tones, down from 700,000 in the January report.

For 2013-14, stocks are forecast at 350,000 tonnes, down from 615,000 tonnes in January.

In grains, it kept is wheat stocks forecast steady, but increased barley carryout to 800,000 tonnes for 2012-13, up from 700,000 in January. For 2013-14 it sees year-end stocks climbing to 1.5 million tonnes, up from 1.3 million.

Oats stocks for 2012-13 are now at 525,000 tonnes, down from 600,000 in January.

For 2013-14 it trimmed its forecast for exports and domestic use to keep oat stocks at 400,000 tonnes.

 

Winnipeg ICE Futures (per tonne)

Canola Mar 13  $632.00, down $11.40       -1.77%

Canola May 13  $621.40, down $10.30       -1.63%

Canola Jul 13  $609.80, down $9.00       -1.45%

Canola Nov 13  $563.60, down $8.20       -1.43%

 

Milling Wheat Mar 13  $291.00, unchanged

Milling Wheat May 13  $294.00, unchanged

Milling Wheat Jul 13  $296.00, unchanged

Milling Wheat Oct 13  $296.00, unchanged

 

Durum Wheat Mar 13  $307.00, unchanged

Durum Wheat May 13  $311.00, unchanged

Durum Wheat Jul 13  $314.00, unchanged

Durum Wheat Oct 13  $299.30, unchanged

 

Barley Mar 13  $241.50, unchanged

Barley May 13  $242.50, unchanged

Barley Jul 13  $243.00, unchanged

Barley Oct 13  $243.00, unchanged

 

Chicago (per bushel)

Soybeans (P) Mar 13  $14.6125, down 26.5       -1.78%

Soybeans (P) May 13  $14.4375, down 26.75       -1.82%

Soybeans (P) Jul 13  $14.29, down 25.5       -1.75%

Soybeans (P) Aug 13  $13.895, down 24.5       -1.73%

Soybeans (P) Sep 13  $13.18, down 17.0       -1.27%

Soybeans (P) Nov 13  $12.6675, down 10.25       -0.80%

 

Corn (P) Mar 13  $6.9025, down 0.5       -0.07%

Corn (P) May 13  $6.8425, down 1.25       -0.18%

Corn (P) Jul 13  $6.7175, down 1.5       -0.22%

Corn (P) Sep 13  $5.73, down 1.0       -0.17%

Corn (P) Dec 13  $5.5275, down 1.25       -0.23%

 

Oats (P) Mar 13  $3.88, down 1.5       -0.39%

Oats (P) May 13  $3.8525, down 2.25       -0.58%

Oats (P) Jul 13  $3.8125, down 1.25       -0.33%

Oats (P) Sep 13  $3.7825, down 1.2       -0.33%

Oats (P) Dec 13  $3.6975, down 2.0       -0.54%

 

Minneapolis (per bushel)

Spring Wheat Mar 13  $8.0275, down 3.75       -0.46%

Spring Wheat May 13  $8.12, down 5.75       -0.70%

Spring Wheat Jul 13  $8.195, down 6.75       -0.82%

Spring Wheat Sep 13  $8.215, down 8.75       -1.05%

Spring Wheat Dec 13  $8.29, down 8.75       -1.04%

 

The Bank of Canada noon rate for the loonie was 97.81 cents US, down about four tenths of a cent from 98.18 on Thursday.

The U.S. buck was $1.0224 Cdn.

Canadian retail sales for December plunged a steeper-than-expected 2.1 percent to $38.62 billion, for the biggest one-month decline since April 2010.

The consumer price index in January rose only 0.5 percent, shy of the expected 0.6 percent. The annual core rate, which strips out some volatile items, climbed a modest one percent, in line with expectations.

The Toronto Stock Exchange’s S&P/TSX composite index rose 61.66 points, or 0.49 percent, finishing at 12,701.63.

The Dow Jones industrial average climbed 119.95 points, or 0.86 percent, to end at 14,000.57.

The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index rose 13.18 points, or 0.88 percent, to finish at 1,515.60.

The Nasdaq Composite Index jumped 30.33 points, or 0.97 percent, to finish at 3,161.82.

For the week, the TSX composite rose 0.12 percent, the Dow edged up 0.1 percent, the S&P 500 slipped 0.3 percent and the Nasdaq lost nearly one percent.