(Businessweek) – Soybeans rose for a fourth day in Chicago on signs that Chinese demand for U.S. supplies is persisting before the harvest in South America accelerates.
China, the world’s top soybean importer, bought 140,000 metric tons from U.S. suppliers in a sale announced yesterday by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. U.S. exporters sold 26.1 million tons to China since the marketing year began Sept. 1, 39 percent more than a year earlier, USDA data show. Total U.S. exports in the 2013-14 season may be 1.495 billion bushels, 1.4 percent more than forecast a month ago, the USDA said Jan. 10.
“The high Chinese demand dynamism has so far remained intact,” Carsten Fritsch, an analyst at Commerzbank AG in Frankfurt, said in an e-mailed report. “Soybean prices have been able to profit from this.”
Brazil, the world’s top soybean exporter, begins harvesting crops this month, increasing the amount of supplies available to importers including China. The USDA last week raised its outlook for Brazil’s harvest to 89 million tons from a previous estimate of 88 million tons. Brazil’s Agriculture Minister Antonio Andrade has said production may reach 95 million tons.
Wheat for March delivery was little changed at $5.7375 a bushel in Chicago after earlier falling as much as 0.5 percent. Prices tumbled to $5.605 on Jan. 10, the lowest since July 2010 after the USDA raised its estimates for global production and ending stockpiles. In Paris, milling wheat for March delivery dropped 0.3 percent to 194.50 euros ($266.02) a ton on NYSE Liffe.
Corn for March delivery declined 0.6 percent to $4.32 a bushel in Chicago.
