Grains and livestock lean higher except soybeans on Thursday.
Corn sees follow through buying after bouncing off key support Wednesday and closes above the 40-day moving average. Jeff Hoogendoorn, Professional Ag Marketing, says that technical action was impressive to him. “The corn market acts like it wants to build off that but I am a little concerned about corn getting back to the top end of the range.”
Corn has been having trouble getting above and closing above a stiffer 50-day resistance area on the charts and is looking for fresh bullish news to keep moving higher.
Hoogendoorn says weather is the next factor the market will focus on and so far, it looks like it will cooperate to allow farmers to make good planting progress. “I’m afraid that’s going to be a bit on the negative side for the corn market in the short term and make it tough to take out those resistance areas on the chart,” he says.
However, with only 90 million acres of corn being planted by farmers that will make any weather issues more of a supportive catalyst for speculators to buy. So, will the funds stay short in the grain markets heading into the growing season? Hoogendoorn says speculators are not traditionally short ahead of the U.S. crop season. “I think they could cover a bigger portion of that position as you get into the last half of April.”
Soybeans fall on disappointing weekly exports of only 7.1 million bushels and the flash sale of 5.6 mb to Mexico did little to improve price action.
Cattle futures stage a recovery rally as the market is oversold and despite some lower cash trade in the North at $188-$189 live and $297-$298 dressed, down $2 to $3 from last week. Yet he says cash has held together better than expected.
Still, can the futures see further buying amid HPAI headlines and uncertainty? Hoogendoorn says the funds lack confidence in the market which could make sustaining rallies difficult.
And lean hog futures were higher again as they’ve attracted fund buying and June contract through the deferreds are hitting new contract highs, but strong demand is also supportive.
