Morning Markets: Corn: +1.25 old & +0.75 new.
Beans: +4.75 old & +4 new. Wheat: +4.75.
MARKET SUMMARY:
Good morning. The ag space is mostly higher to start Thursday morning, with the grains seeing reversal action from Wednesday and continuing to chop sideways while the beans are trying to build on yesterday's strength but unable to push to new highs still at this point in the morning. With there again little in the way of new news this morning from a supply and demand standpoint, we see Thursday's focus as likely being on the coming round of winter weather for the US south and southeast that will presumably bring about logistics issues, and also macro headlines, with the World Economic Forum ongoing and things still seemingly not 100% hunky-dory between the US and the EU. Corn futures this morning are trading around a penny higher, soybean futures are trading 3-4 cents higher, and the Chicago wheat market is trading 2-3 cents higher.
Crude Oil is down $0.67 at $59.95
US Dollar is down at $98.61
Dow futures are up 235 points at 49,500
WEATHER:
- Models this morning are still having troubles with the exact path of the coming winter storm system expected to impact to the southern and central US the back half of this week and weekend; the GFS continues to be further to the south with the heaviest snow bands, while the EU model has been moving things north over the past few runs. There is decent agreement on the timing, but exact snowfall amounts and locations will be hard to predict. While logistics concerns in the south are obviously a concern, there is also marginal concern for winterkill in the current wheat crop due to a lack of sufficient snow cover in some areas.
- Nothing new for the South American forecast this morning, as the models remain in decent agreement on a pocket of near complete dryness for the northeastern part of Argentina and through Uruguay/Paraguay and then into southern Brazil. To the north, regular monsoonal rains look to continue to slow the start of harvest here, while lighter, more scattered precip is expected to fall across southern and western Argentina. Generally speaking, this pattern is seen lasting at least into the first of the month, which has raised some dryness concerns for the northeastern parts of Argentina's ag regions.
OTHER HEADLINES:
- This morning's weekly ethanol report from the EIA, delayed a day this week for the Monday holiday, is expected to show average US daily production in the week ending January 16th between 1.10-1.186 mil bbls, while stocks in the week are seen between 24.00-24.90 mil bbls. The report will be out at 11am central time this morning.
- Natural gas futures have again popped to new highs this morning on the coming cold spell for the US, with prices on the February contract now almost exactly where they topped out at last spring in March. This level, at 5.551, will likely be fairly significant resistance on the charts today. Metals markets are mixed, crude oil futures are down around $1/bbl, and the stock index futures are all moderately higher to start this morning.
- Headlines regarding the sale of year-round E15 in the US are again popping up with regularity this morning, though we have little new to report on the situation that hasn't been discussed the last couple days. According to a Politico article, Republican members of the House have been unable to reach an agreement that would allow the proposed government funding package to move forward, with a Wednesday evening House Rules Committee meeting ending without a solution. The panel is expected to resume later today.
- Progress on peace talks in Ukraine seems to again be trying to make some headway this morning, with Reuters reporting that President Putin would be discussing a possible agreement with Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner on Thursday. A separate source indicated that President Trump would also be meeting with Zelensky soon to discuss a peace plan, and that an agreement was "very close."
EXPORT NEWS:
- Private exporters reported sales of 192,350 metric tons of soybeans for delivery to unknown destinations during the 2025/2026 marketing year.
Be careful!
Bailey Runyen
Grain Originator | Topflight Grain Coop.
101 N. Main St. | Cisco, IL 61830
Phone :: 217-669-2141
Email :: brunyen@tfgrain.com
