-Corn exports slightly above range of ideas
-Soybean exports within expectations
-Wheat exports at bottom of expectations
U.S. corn exports, for the week ended 5/27/21, were 2.049 MMT (80.7 million bushels), slightly above the range of market ideas of 1.5-2.0 MMT (59.1-78.7 mil bu), up solidly from the previous week’s 1.746 MMT (68.7 mil bu), the highest in four weeks and 2nd highest of the last eight weeks. This week’s activity included 1.035 MMT shipped to China, leaving roughly 8.4 MMT (330 mil bu) in unshipped purchases officially on the books, but may be as much as 9.5 MMT when taking into account sales to “unknown.” Cumulative export inspections of 2.006 billion bushels are maintaining a 78% year-over-year increase, leaving corn exports needing to average roughly 47 million bushels/week during June-August in order to reach the USDA’s 2.775 billion bushel export projection, which we continue to view as being moderately too low. Export activity to China has shown no signs of slowing down and we anticipate the vast majority of old crop sales on the books to be shipped by the end of the marketing year.
U.S. soybean exports last week were 192k tonnes (7.1 million bushels), within market expectations of 90-400k tonnes (3.3-14.7 million bushels) and compared to 222k tonnes (8.2 mil bu) the week prior and 452k tonnes (16.6 mil bu) last year. More importantly, soybean shipments are keeping up with the USDA’s 2.280 billion bushel annual production, requiring weekly shipments of roughly 7.6 million bushels through the end of August vs the 8.5 million bushels/week average over the last seven weeks. Activity to China remains minimal with only 5k tonnes shipped during the week, while last week’s Export Sales data showed their outstanding/unshipped old crop purchases still at 702k tonnes. For now, the pace of export sales and shipment activity has been enough to support the USDA’s export projection, which we anticipate being left unchanged in next week’s WASDE report.
U.S. wheat exports, in the last full week of the 2020/21 marketing year, were 256k tonnes (9.4 million bushels), at the bottom of market expectations of 250-625k tonnes (9.2-23.0 mil bu), down from the previous week’s 599k tonnes (22.0 mil bu) and were near the marketing year low of 8.9 million bushels in mid-October last year. With cumulative Export Inspections at 927 million bushels, official Census Bureau annual exports estimated to be 25 million bushels larger than Inspections and with annual wheat flour/product exports estimated at 20 million bushels equivalent, effective total U.S. wheat exports stand at 972 million bushels vs the USDA’s 965 million bushel annual projection with four days remaining in 2020/21 from this week’s data “as of” date. Accordingly, final exports are likely to prove slightly higher than the USDA’s current projection.
