ADMISI London Wheat Report for 4 January

Global commodity markets were in the red today after fears of weakening global demand weighed heavily on prices. US wheat markets were well down. Chicago and Kansas contracts were nearly 30 cents down and MW down 16 cents, at the time of writing. French and London wheat were also trading negatively all day.

Reuters reported today that traders said ‘’Russia’s January wheat exports will remain high for this time of the July-June marketing season – at at least 3.6 million tonnes – after a huge 2022 grain crop’’ Russia, the world’s largest wheat exporter, harvested a record grain crop of 151.0 million tonnes after drying and cleaning, including 102.7 million tonnes of wheat, according to preliminary official 2022 data. Export data was suspended by the Russians to avoid “speculation” after it launched what it calls its special military operation in Ukraine on Feb. 24. Estimates for Decembers exports are between 4.1M tonnes and 4.5M. Those reporting these estimates also said prices for Russian wheat with 12.5% protein content and for immediate supply from Black Sea ports were unchanged at $307-$311 per tonne at the end of last week. 

In Europe there is worsening bird Flu news. The latest country to take large action to try and curb the increasing risk,  Czech republic. The authorities there today announced they will be destroying between 750K & 1 Million birds at the center of its worst bird flu outbreak to date. 

Tunisia’s state grains agency has issued an international tender to purchase around 100,000 tonnes of soft milling wheat and about 75,000 tonnes of animal feed barley, European traders said on Wednesday. The origin was optional. The deadline for submission of price offers in the tender is believed to be Thursday, Jan. 5.

London May 23 traded £3.00/ tonne down on yesterday’s settlement until lunchtime, it then fell further and never recovered, eventually closing down @ £241. Whilst volumes were nothing to write home about, they are an improvement of late. The contract traded over 250 times across the board, the majority of which was on May 23. Nov 23 traded  a total of 10 times at £230. 10 lots also went through on Nov 24 @ £225.