Winnipeg canola futures closed mixed Friday with the two nearby contracts up slightly and the deferred contracts down slightly.
Chicago soybeans were down most of the day on pressure from a stronger U.S. dollar and falling crude oil prices, but rallied on commodity fund buying.
Two private forecasters released acreage outlooks for U.S. crops, both calling for corn and soybean area to be larger than it was last year.
The May canola contract rose 20 cents to $377.80 per tonne on 4,969 trades. The previous day’s best basis was steady at -$7.75 per tonne off the May contract in the par region, according to the Winnipeg ICE Futures daily report.
On the week, the May contract rose 30 cents per tonne.
The 14-day Relative Strength Index for May canola fell to 39, according to BarChart.com. The rule of thumb is an RSI of 30 indicates an oversold market and 70 indicates overbought.
July rose 20 cents to $383.30 on 2,040 trades.
New crop November fell 30 cents to $388.80 per tonne on 2,484 trades.
The Canadian dollar at noon was 98.47 cents US, down from 98.63 cents at noon the previous trading day. The U.S. dollar at noon was $1.0155 Cdn.
The Winnipeg May barley contract was steady at $154 on no trades and only 11 open interest contracts. July was steady at $145. December was steady at $150.
May soybeans rose 2.25 cents to $9.6175 US per bushel. November soybeans rose two cents to $9.42 per bu.
May oats fell one cent to $2.245 per bu.
Light crude oil for April delivery fell $1.52 to $80.68 per barrel.
Analysts Allendale Inc. forecast 2010 U.S. corn plantings at 90.152 million acres and soybean plantings at 79.111 million, based on its survey of farmers. That would be up from 86.5 million acres last year and would be the second largest seeded area on record.
Given a trend line of rising yields, it would produce the largest U.S. corn crop in history.
Allendale’s soybean forecast would be a record, up from 77.5 million acres last year.
It forecast all wheat seedings of 53.467 million acres, the smallest since 1970 and well below the 2009 figure of 59.1 million.
Analytical firm Informa Economics projected corn acres at 88.4 million and soybean area at 78.6 million on Friday.
