USDA left domestic balance sheets for corn and soybeans unchanged in the February WASDE but did make slight revisions in South American production.
For soybeans Brazil production was unchanged at a record 169 million metric tons.But the agency lowered Argentina production by 3 million metric tons to 49 million.
Jim McCormick, AgMarket.Net says, “Yes, they did lower the Brazilian, or excuse me, the Argentina crop. And that was expected. Argentina’s been dealing with some dry weather.”
The question now is what happens with weather in South America and possible future revisions because their soybean crop is still a record and larger than last year.
Plus, while world ending stocks were lowered by 4 million metric tons, it doesn’t move the needle.
“On the world numbers it really doesn’t matter. I mean you’re still looking at they get very close to record all -time highs of beans. In the world stocks use one to two, number one or number two, stocks use records at all -time highs. So we’ve got plenty of beans.”
South American corn production was also lowered by 1 million metric ton in Argentina, but also a million metric tons in Brazil, and the later surprised McCormick.
“I’m guessing they’re gonna plant the Safrinha crop late, which maybe means maybe not as many acres, or potentially you could run out of water here.”
World carryout was lowered 3 million tons on corn and at 290 million, it leaves little room for error.
“The world carry out number on the corn. It continues to shrink. It’s one of the tightest stocks used we’ve had in the last few years. So what this means, is it is going to put the pressure on the safrihna crop that’s just getting planted. And then the U .S. crop and how many acres we can get in as well as how this crop produces.”
McCormick thinks the reason USDA left domestic numbers unchanged was due to the uncertainty of tariffs and the effect of retaliatory tariffs on U.S. exports.
Corn: 1.540 billion bu. for 2024-25, unchanged from 1.540 billion bu. in January
— compares with 1.763 billion bu. in 2023-24
Beans: 380 million bu. for 2024-25, unchanged from 380 million bu. in January
— compares with 342 million bu. in 2023-24
Wheat: 794 million bu. for 2024-25, down from 798 million bu. in January
— compares with 696 million bu. in 2023-24
