By: NATHAN STUEDLE
St. Joseph Post
GRAINS:
July corn closed up 5 1/4 cents and December corn was up 1 3/4 cents. July soybeans closed down 8 1/4 cents and November soybeans were down 7 cents. July KC wheat closed down 1 1/2 cents, July Chicago wheat was up 5 1/4 cents, July Minneapolis wheat was up 4 1/4 cents.
In an overall mixed session across ag markets Wednesday, corn and wheat managed to recover some of the early week losses, with the latter finally finding some buying interest as KC and Chicago contracts again set new contract lows early in the session. Soybean futures were under pressure for most of the day, as weak energy markets induced more profit-taking in soybean oil futures. Crude oil prices, in particular, are down for the third straight session, with NYMEX futures working toward the lowest close for the front-month contract in over four years Wednesday. Equity markets were lower but recovered off daily lows. Early pressure can be attributed to U.S. GDP through the first quarter of 2025 reporting the first quarterly decline since 2022, driven primarily by a surge in imports as consumers and businesses attempt to work ahead of planned tariff policy. Losses were trimmed throughout the session, however, after Personal Consumption Expenditure data (a Fed policy favorite), indicated inflation was slightly cooler in March than initially expected.
LIVESTOCK:
It will be interesting to see what takes shape this week in the live cattle complex as earlier in the week trader support was plentiful, but upon Wednesday's arrival traders have shown some caution and packers have already begun to offer bids in the North. On the bullish side of the spectrum, feedlot managers are likely going to try to hold out and pressure packers into paying steady/higher prices later this week. On the opposite side of the spectrum, however, packers are desperate to get ahead of the cash cattle market and they're throwing every trick in the book at the marketplace to dramatically reduce throughput, including offering bids early in the week in hopes that some feedlot managers will get antsy and let some cattle go early. But as always, it's too early in the week to say what's going to exactly happen which is why we need to track the market all the more closely.
Just like the live cattle complex, the feeder cattle contracts were also lower as traders are skeptical of getting too far ahead of themselves, and overbuying/over supporting the market much more. It's unlikely the day's lower tone in the futures complex will gravely affect sales in the countryside as buyers know that the availability of feeders/calves is quite thin.
The lean hog complex traded lower as the market is under pressure technically. Without better support from its fundamentals, it's unlikely the contracts will be able to gain any sort of momentum. It's interesting to note that packers were fairly aggressive in the day's cash market, but pork cutout values continued to drift lower.
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