Wheat

Chicago wheat ended the session mostly lower, as the complex surrendered part of the modest recovery seen at the end of last week. December 2025 CBOT wheat closed at $5.30¼/bu, down ¾ cent on the day, while KC HRW contracts were fractionally weaker in the nearby months and MPLS spring wheat finished mixed, with December up ¾ cent but deferred contracts down 2–3 cents. Export inspections told a soft story, with just 384,881 tonnes of wheat shipped in the week to 27 November, nearly 20% below the previous week, though still close to 29% above the same week a year earlier. Delayed Export Sales data for the week ending 23 October did offer a small bright spot at 499,778 tonnes of wheat sold, in the middle of trade expectations and well above both the previous week and the same period last year, but on balance the wheat board continues to trade under the weight of strong global production signals and only modest US demand.

Corn

Corn futures gave back part of last week’s late gains, with nearby contracts closing 2–3 cents lower and December 2025 corn settling at $4.32¾/bu, down 2¾ cents. The US national average cash corn price slipped back to about $3.99/bu, reflecting both weaker futures and cautious farmer selling. Export inspections came in at 1.421 MMT in the week to 27 November, nearly 50% above the same week last year but 16% below the prior week, with Japan, Mexico and Colombia as key destinations. Export Sales data for the week ending 23 October showed corn sales easing to 1.8 MMT, still within expectations but 36% below the previous week, even as accumulated sales (shipped plus unshipped) remain 37% above last year at 35.37 MMT. In Brazil, AgRural estimates the first corn crop at 99% planted, a touch ahead of last year’s pace, while StoneX has trimmed its corn production estimate to 134.4 MMT, hinting that early-season optimism is being tempered by emerging weather and demand dynamics.

Soybeans

Soybean futures resumed active trade after the holiday-shortened week, ending Monday with a clear downward correction. January 2026 soybeans closed at $11.28/bu, down 9¾ cents, even as the national average US cash bean price stayed relatively firm at about $10.57½/bu. Soymeal futures fell by $3.30–$4.80, while soyoil rallied again, adding 29–55 points and reinforcing the outperformance of the oil component within the soybean complex. Export inspections for soybeans reached 920,194 tonnes in the week to 27 November, up nearly 14% from the previous week but still 56% below the same week in 2024 and notably with no shipments to China; Italy, Egypt and Mexico led the destination list. Export Sales data for the week ending 23 October showed 1.45 MMT of soybean sales, on the high side of expectations, yet still more than a third below last year, highlighting how US soy remains heavily dependent on renewed Chinese buying to sustain momentum.

Global Market Drivers and Key Headlines

Across the broader complex, yesterday’s trade underlined how a soy- and veg-oil-led market is still constrained by abundant grain supplies and a re-shuffling of risk. Nearby SRW and HRW wheat slipped, corn eased and soybeans corrected from recent highs, even as year-to-date tables still show grains in the red and oilseeds – especially soyoil – strongly positive. Chinese January 2026 futures reinforced that divergence, with soybeans and soyoil firmer, corn slightly softer and Malaysian palm oil easing to around 4,094 ringgit per tonne, a reminder that speculative attention continues to gravitate toward oils and oilseeds rather than cereals.

Trade and demand data from the long-delayed US Export Sales reports added another layer of nuance. The catch-up release for the week ending 16 October confirmed very strong corn sales – the biggest weekly volume in about a year – alongside solid but not spectacular wheat business and the first marketing-year soybean sales above 1 MMT, yet still well below last year’s pace. The follow-up report for the week to 23 October showed corn sales easing back to 1.8 MMT and soybean sales at 1.45 MMT, with no new business to China at that point, underscoring how much of the forward demand story still hinges on whether Chinese buying steps up in the winter window. Weekly inspections for the week to 27 November pointed in the same mixed direction: corn shipments well above last year but down on the week, wheat loadings weaker than the prior week, and soybean exports higher week-on-week but barely half of last year’s volumes for the same period.

South American fundamentals remained a key focus as the trade weighed large theoretical crops against increasingly uneven field conditions. In Brazil, multiple sources now peg 2025/26 soybean planting at roughly the high-80s percent of intended area, slightly behind last year, with CONAB data and private consultancies both highlighting irregular rainfall over the past three months. CEPEA reports that excess moisture in the South and patchy showers in the Central-West have slowed fieldwork and raised questions over yield potential, even as farmers delay forward sales and benefit from firmer domestic prices at Paraná and Paranaguá – both indices now at their highest real levels of the year. On corn, CEPEA notes that a rebound in domestic demand has pulled spot prices higher across most regions, as buyers step back in to rebuild inventories and secure late-2025 coverage, while analysts warn that high stocks and the arrival of the US crop could still cap any extended rally.

In the Black Sea and Central Asia, supply-side signals continued to highlight comfortable global availability, but with meaningful regional constraints. Ukraine now expects its 2025 grain harvest to reach around 60 MMT, plus up to 20 MMT of oilseeds, and officials estimate that roughly two-thirds of this output will be exported, reinforcing Ukraine’s status as a core supplier of wheat, corn and oilseeds. At the same time, cumulative exports of grains and legumes since 1 July stand at only 12.14 MMT, down 32% year on year, with corn shipments down by half and both wheat and barley also lower – a clear reflection of ongoing logistical bottlenecks and altered trade corridors. Kazakhstan adds further competition into the wider region, having harvested a record 27.1 MMT of grain, including 20.3 MMT of wheat, and already shipping 3.1 MMT between 1 September and 27 November to buyers in Central Asia, Iran, Azerbaijan and Afghanistan.

Australia remained in the spotlight on two fronts: crops and cattle. On the crop side, surveys ahead of this week’s ABARES update suggest the country is on track for its third-largest wheat crop on record, its biggest-ever barley harvest and its second-largest canola crop, with analysts lifting output estimates on the back of timely pre-harvest rains in the south and better-than-expected yields in the west. Some 2–3 MMT of wheat around Esperance in Western Australia may be downgraded to feed quality after recent downpours, but volumes still look hefty compared with previous years and are likely to reinforce the global surplus narrative in cereals. On the livestock side, the rapid expansion of grain-fed beef – feedlots like Gundamain doubling capacity as they fatten thousands of Black Angus cattle on barley, silage, cottonseed and molasses – is helping Australia capture market share from US exporters in Asian markets that prize grain-fed beef, deepening the structural link between Australian feed demand and regional grain balances.

Vegetable-oil markets were heavily shaped by policy and forward-buying moves in Asia. India made unusually long-dated purchases of South American soyoil, securing more than 150,000 tonnes per month for April–July 2026 at a discount of about $20–30/t to palm oil over that period. Traders say this “insurance” reflects expectations that Indonesia’s planned expansion of its biodiesel mandate from B40 to B50 in late 2026 will soak up exportable palm supplies and push global palm prices higher, while weaker sunflower crops in the Black Sea and Europe could constrain sunflower oil availability. Forward spreads already show Black Sea sunflower oil priced $230–250/t above South American soyoil for that window, even as in the near term palm oil still trades $90–100/t cheaper than soybean oil, prompting some Indian buyers to cancel prompt soyoil cargoes and pivot back to palm despite the seasonal preference for soy in winter.

On the palm side itself, Indonesian and Malaysian developments continued to recalibrate benchmarks. Indonesia cut its crude palm oil reference price to $926.14/t for December, from $963.75/t in November, lowering the export tax to $74/t while maintaining an additional levy of 10% of the reference price. Official data show Indonesian palm oil exports (excluding kernel oil, oleochemicals and biodiesel) up 7.83% year on year to 19.49 MMT in January–October, and industry group GAPKI reports no major production impact so far from serious floods in Sumatra. Malaysia, by contrast, is expected to show November exports of about 1.26 MMT, down from 1.50 MMT in October, reinforcing the idea that shifting trade flows – not absolute supply shortages – are currently driving spreads and relative value across palm, soyoil and sunflower oil.

Finally, disease and protein-sector dynamics added a more indirect, but still relevant, layer to grain and oilseed sentiment. Spain is battling a cluster of African swine fever cases in wild boar near Barcelona, with up to 14 suspected infections and about one-third of pork export certificates temporarily blocked – a serious threat to an €8.8-billion-a-year pork export industry. Several key buyers, including Taiwan, China, the UK and Mexico, have already imposed bans or suspensions on Spanish pork, moves that could shift feed demand and meat trade flows within Europe and beyond. When combined with Australia’s push to double its grain-fed beef capacity by 2027, these developments underscore how animal-protein markets are in flux and how changes in pork and beef supply chains can feed back into longer-term demand for grains and oilseeds.