By Phil Franz-Warkentin
Glacier FarmMedia MarketsFarm – The ICE Futures canola market was sharply higher on Monday, as gains in outside vegetable oil markets provided spillover support.
Chicago soyoil, European rapeseed and Malaysian palm oil futures were all higher, with crude oil also up on the day.
Bullish chart signals added to the strength, with the nearby May contract settling just below the psychological C$650 per tonne level. However, some technical indicators were starting to look overbought which tempered the advances.
Read Also
Canadian Financial Close: Loonie returns above 72 U.S. cents
By Glen Hallick Glacier Farm Media | MarketsFarm – The Canadian dollar on Friday finally turned around to close higher,…
Statistics Canada reported that 897,790 tonnes of canola were crushed in the country in February, which was down by four per cent from January but up by 10.5 per cent from the same month a year ago.
There were an estimated 38,792 contracts traded on Monday, which compares with Friday when 37,833 contracts traded. Spreading accounted for 17,896 of the contracts traded.
CBOT soybeans climb higher ahead of USDA acreage report
SOYBEAN futures at the Chicago Board of Trade were stronger on Monday, with positioning ahead of Thursday’s prospective plantings report from the United States Department of Agriculture behind some of the activity.
General expectations ahead of the report are that U.S. soybean acres will come in below what the USDA forecast in its Agriculture Outlook Forum in February, with average trade guesses coming in around 86.5 million acres. While that would be down by about a million acres from the February forecast, it would still be well above the 83.6 million acres of soybeans seeded in 2023.
Broad strength in global vegetable oil markets was especially supportive for soyoil, with the buying there spilling into beans as well.
CORN futures held closer to unchanged, settling with small losses in the most active months.
Expectations that U.S. farmers will seed more corn acres than earlier thought accounted for some of the selling, with average pre-report guesses around 92 million acres. However, if realized, that would still amount to a cut of two million acres to U.S. corn seedings on the year.
Weekly U.S. corn export inspections of 1.2 million tonnes were down by about 100,000 tonnes from the previous week, although year-to-date exports of 24.4 million tonnes are up by 34 per cent on the year.
WHEAT was narrowly mixed at the final bell, as values continued to consolidate just above nearby contract lows.
Weekly U.S. wheat export inspections of about 315,000 tonnes were down slightly from the previous week, with the year-to-date movement of 14.2 million tonnes running 15 per cent behind last year’s pace.
Much of the northern U.S. Plains saw some welcome moisture over the weekend, with more precipitation in the forecast which was easing dryness concerns for winter wheat in the region.
