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Good Morning farm country. Davis Michaelsen here with your morning update for Wednesday, May 19. From Pro Farmer’s First Thing Today, these are some of the stories we are watching this morning:
Corn futures are 4 to 7 cents lower with traders booking some profits after yesterday’s gains. Soybeans are down 8 to 15 cents amid similar action. Rains are boosting soil moisture for rapidly planted crops in the U.S. and rains are expected for Brazil’s safrinha corn areas later this week. HRW wheat futures are down 14 to 15cents, with SRW wheat 12 to 13 cents lower. Spring wheat is down 7 to 9 cents. The greenback is higher today.
Crop stress for Brazil’s safrinha corn may be “very near a peak due to expected rainfall Friday and Saturday and again next week,” says World Weather Inc. The precipitation will come too late to restore yield potential for around 60% of the crop that has already silked and pollinated.
Scouts on the first day of the Wheat Quality Council tour projected an average HRW wheat yield of 59.2 bu. per acre for northern Kansas, up sharply from 2019’s 46.9 bu. per acre. (Last year an abbreviated, largely virtual tour was conducted by the Kansas Wheat Commission, Kansas State University Extension and the Kansas ag department.) This was the highest figure for Day 1 of the tour dating back to 2000.
Brazil’s private ports data compiled by the port lobby group ATP shows the country’s private terminals moved around 185 MMT of cargo during the first quarter of 2021, an 11% increase from year-ago. Trade in mineral and ag commodities drove the rise.
Two Republican senators, Roger Marshall of Kansas and Kevin Cramer of North Dakota, unveiled a measure to bar the Biden administration from carrying out its 30x30 initiative. “The best thing the federal government can do is trust the environmental judgment of farmers and ranchers and let them do what they do best: steward the land,” says Marshall.
Positions on various trade issues that were expected to be addressed during the first meeting of the Free Trade Commission (FTC) established under the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement do not appear to have shifted from where things stood before the meetings this week in Washington. Talks between U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai and her Mexican and Canadian counterparts produced no major shifts on trade issues.
The Biden administration wants to give consumers rebates for purchasing electric vehicles to help the U.S. compete against China in manufacturing the next generation of automobiles, White House Climate Advisor Gina McCarthy said.
President Biden is expected to order his administration to create a strategy to quantify risks for both public and private financial assets posed by climate change. The executive order will direct Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen to share climate-related financial risk data and issue a report.
Live cattle futures posted moderate gains Tuesday, with traders working to align futures with the cash market. Trade is off to an early start, with action ranging from $119 to $123, with Nebraska leading gains. This as boxed beef values continue to climb.
Lean hog futures also got a bit of a lift from news of Argentina’s temporary ban on beef exports, as China has been an aggressive importer of protein and especially pork in the wake of a devastating African swine fever outbreak. Cash hog bids climbed 91 cents on a national average basis Tuesday.
