Weekly Market Update 1/16/2025

Here is your weekly market update from the Garden City Co-op Grain Origination Team.

Trivia

1.  Which freezes faster: hot or cold water?

2. What is the only planet in our solar system that rotates clockwise on its axis versus counterclockwise?

Answers at the bottom.

Market New
 

LOCAL MARKET UPDATE: Large supplies of grain in our local markets is pushing basis values lower, particularly when it comes to corn and milo. We’ve been talking about how poor milo demand is for a while, with no exports our crop is flooding local feed and ethanol markets – pushing their bids weaker and in turn pushing our elevator bids weaker. We are hearing indications that many end users have already purchased the milo bushels they will need to use through May and are putting on coverage for the mid-summer months. The only wild card on the table for milo is what the tariff situation will look like post-inauguration, and if that means anything different for Chinese demand. Likewise, the local corn market continues to weaken, with a large Nebraska and eastern Kansas corn crop finding its way into western Kansas feed markets at cheap, cheap basis values relative to historic norms. Corn end users have moved bids lower with a flood of bushels hitting the market, which has significantly pressured our sellable markets, resulting in lower posted bids at our elevators. A silver lining to the pressure on the basis side is that futures have rallied around 40 cents since the beginning of December, so cash prices have been relatively stable.

EXPORT INSPECTIONS: Corn export inspections significantly exceeded expectations, with 56.7 million bushels shipped this past week, surpassing estimates of 7.9 to 17.7 million bushels. Japan replaced Mexico as the largest destination last week, importing nearly 18 million bushels, while Mexico took almost 16 million bushels. This shipment surge is unusual for this time of year, so it will be interesting to see how the next few weeks unfold. In contrast, (HRW) inspections fell short of estimates last week10.6 million bushels, with Mexico receiving close to half of the loadings, which were primarily transported by rail. The HRW shipments were reported to Mexico, Japan, and South Korea. For soybeans, 49.6 million bushels were reported, landing at the lower end of estimates and below the 10-week average. No milo was inspected.

EXPORT SALES: Export sales seen an increase in volume this week compared to last week’s values. Old crop corn sales totaled 40.3 million bushels and no N/C corn sales were reported. Corn sales this week once again fall below the running 10-week average, currently calculated at 40.3 million bushels. Corn sit 9% above the marketing year-to-date sales relative to the seasonal pace needed to reach USDA targets. Soybean sales totaled 20.9 million bushels this week as market demand remains high. No N/C soybean sales were reported this week. Old crop wheat sales totaled 18.9 million bushels sold and 0.3 million bushels of N/C sales were reported. No O/C or N/C milo sales were reported; with the running 10-week average remaining at 1.4 million bushels.

SOYBEAN CRUSH: Soybean crush remained strong into the end of 2024. December’s monthly NOPA crush report was released this week and indicated that 206.6 million bushels of soybeans were crushed for the month. This was well ahead of the 205.5-million-bushel trade guess and significantly ahead of November 2024 at 193.2 million bushels. This was a record NOPA crush number for any single month. September-December 2024 crush was 777 million bushels, 5% ahead of last year’s number for the same period and very close to the year-over-year crush increase that USDA is calling for. Domestic demand prospects remain strong for soybeans headed into 2025, which will be important with a big South American crop on the horizon.



WEATHER: Hopefully you haven’t put your winter coats up just yet, after a few warm days gracing us this week, we are back to chilly temperatures throughout the area moving into the weekend forecast. Your Friday forecast is sunny and gusty, with a high temperature near 52°F and wind gusts as high as 36 mph possible; overnight temperatures expected around 18°F with increasing cloud coverage throughout the night. Saturday holds a 20% chance of snow after noon, with mostly cloudy skies and high temperatures near 27°F. The evening hours present partly cloudy skies with a low temperature of 5°F. Sunday appears colder yet again, with a high of 24°F throughout the day and a low of 3°F overnight. Sunday night moving into the morning hours Monday, and persisting throughout the remainder of the day, a 40% chance of snow is likely after midnight. Perhaps one of our coldest evenings yet, Monday night is predicted to be partly cloudy skies with a low temperature around -3°F. The remaining first portion of next week looks to be mostly sunny skies, with a high temperature on Tuesday and Wednesday of 25 and 38°F, respectively.

Trivia Answers

1. Hot

2. Venus