Corn, soy barge bids flat ahead of long US weekend
Basis bids for corn and soybeans delivered by barge to U.S. Gulf Coast terminals were mostly steady on Friday, supported by a generally quiet pace of farmer selling ahead of a three-day weekend, traders said.
U.S. markets and most government offices will be closed on Monday in observance of Memorial Day.
At the Gulf on Friday, CIF corn barges loaded in May were bid at 69 cents over Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT) July corn (CN25) futures and June corn barges were bid at 68 cents over futures, both unchanged from Thursday.
FOB export premiums for corn shipped from the Gulf in June held steady at about 80 cents over CBOT July futures.
For soybeans, CIF barges loaded in May were bid at 62 cents over CBOT July (SN25) soybean futures, unchanged from Thursday, while June soy barges were bid at 67 cents over futures, down a penny from Thursday.
FOB export premiums for soybeans loaded from the Gulf in June were nominally offered around 78 cents over July futures but suppliers had little available until late August, traders said.
Farmer sales of old- and new-crop corn and soy increased slightly toward week's end as growers in some areas wrapped up spring planting, but the movement of grain from the country into river elevators remained quiet overall, traders said, a factor that kept a floor under Gulf basis bids.
In global trade, Iraq has procured more than 2 million tons of local wheat in the current harvest that started in April, the director general of Iraq's grain board told Reuters.
Crop ratings for France's main wheat crop fell last week while spring barley conditions deteriorated sharply, farm office FranceAgriMer reported, as dry weather persisted in portions of the EU's biggest grain producer.
