Chicago Wheat, Corn and Soybeans – Start of Wednesday Trade
Wheat is softer but broadly steady at the start of Wednesday’s session, with December 2025 CBOT wheat trading around $5.36¼ per bushel, unchanged from Tuesday’s close after a mixed day across US exchanges. The complex is digesting a largely steady US WASDE, unchanged US ending stocks at 901 million bushels and higher global stocks driven by bigger crops in Canada, Australia, Argentina, the EU and Russia. Overnight SRW is down about 2 cents, HRW fractionally lower and HRS flat, while managed money has recently trimmed its net short in Chicago and fresh EU data show soft-wheat exports only slightly behind last year even as Coceral trims its 2026 EU+UK crop outlook and Argentina cuts its wheat export tax to 7.5%.
Corn is starting Wednesday with a slightly softer tone after Tuesday’s rally, with December 2025 CBOT corn trading just under $4.40 per bushel, fractionally below yesterday’s settlement at $4.40¾ following a 4–5 cent gain. The market is still reacting to a bullish WASDE cut in US ending stocks by 125 million bushels to 2.029 billion, entirely via higher exports, while world 2025/26 corn stocks are trimmed to 279.15 MMT on reduced US and Ukrainian output despite higher Argentine carryover. Overnight, corn is down about ¾ cent after being up ¼ cent earlier, the US national cash index is near $4.03½, and open interest has risen by more than 6,400 contracts, signalling fresh buying and short covering ahead of renewed South American weather and export headlines.
Soybeans are weaker again in early Wednesday trade, with January 2026 CBOT soybeans hovering around $10.82¾ per bushel, roughly 4½ cents below Tuesday’s settlement at $10.87¼ after nearby contracts lost 6–8 cents yesterday. WASDE left the US soybean balance unchanged, keeping ending stocks at 290 million bushels, while world stocks were nudged only slightly higher to 122.37 MMT and South American production estimates stayed steady. The US cash bean index has slipped to $10.18¼, soymeal and soyoil futures are also lower, and a delayed CFTC report shows just how crowded the long side has become, with managed money net long in soybeans surging by more than 60,000 contracts to 178,683 as of early November, the largest two-week bullish build on record.
Key Global Drivers and Headlines for Today’s Session
Argentina is at the centre of today’s macro story after President Javier Milei’s government cut export taxes on soybeans, products, corn and wheat, reinforcing his pledge to dismantle levies that have weighed on farmers for years. The new permanent rates take soybeans to 24% from 26%, soymeal and soyoil to 22.5% from 24.5%, wheat to 7.5% from 9.5% and corn to 8.5% from 9.5%, a structural shift that improves the competitiveness of Argentine origin versus the US and Brazil just as the country harvests a huge wheat crop and plants soybeans. The move is explicitly framed as a long-run boost to agriculture and is likely to encourage higher marketed volumes over time, adding another aggressive exporter into an already well-supplied global grain and oilseed matrix.
In Europe, medium-term supply signals are turning slightly less comfortable. Industry group Coceral projects 2026 EU+UK grain output at 296.7 MMT, down 3% from 306.6 MMT in 2025, with soft wheat seen at 143.9 MMT versus 147.5 MMT and barley at 58.2 MMT versus 63.2 MMT. While recent rains have left soil moisture favourable and crop development ahead of winter generally good, yields are expected to normalise from this year’s exceptional levels. Corn production is forecast to recover modestly to 58.9 MMT from 57.1 MMT after 2025’s drought-hit harvest, but farmers disappointed by past corn yields are expected to keep trimming corn area in favour of spring crops such as sunflower and soybeans, particularly in the Balkans and France. Rapeseed output is pegged flat year-on-year at 21.8 MMT, signalling stable EU oilseed availability.
By contrast, India is heading for record winter crop acreage, adding another major source of potential supply to the global balance sheet. Farmers have so far sown 47.9 million hectares of winter crops since 1 October, up 6.1% year-on-year, including 24.14 million hectares of wheat (+10.8%), 8 million of rapeseed (+4.5%) and 7.8 million of chickpeas (+3.5%), supported by abundant monsoon rainfall, high reservoir levels and strong soil moisture. Higher wheat output would help cool domestic prices and could eventually allow limited exports of wheat flour, while larger rapeseed harvests would trim India’s reliance on imported palm, soyoil and sunflower oil. The La Niña pattern is expected to bring colder-than-normal winters to northern India, which, if weather stays supportive from mid-January to mid-March, could further improve yields.
China’s supply picture looks steady but remains critical for global wheat and oilseed flows. The 2026/27 Chinese wheat crop is projected at about 141.0 MMT, unchanged from the previous estimate, with winter wheat sowing virtually complete and soil moisture adequate across key producing regions. Temperatures have been near to slightly above normal with generally near- to below-normal rainfall, and the seasonal outlook points to near-normal to slightly warmer conditions and near-normal precipitation across the main wheat belt, supportive for establishment if realised. On the US side, USDA’s latest farmer-reported acreage update shows prevented plantings only marginally changed since September and planted area (including failed acres) at 97.24 million acres of corn, 80.30 million of soybeans and 48.89 million of wheat, reinforcing the current balance sheet while reminding markets that some data were delayed by this autumn’s government shutdown.
Weather remains a central intraday driver, especially in the Americas. In Brazil, heavy rain over the last week in central and northern regions has been “sorely needed” for developing and reproductive soybeans, while a stronger system moving through the south is delivering widespread, locally heavy rainfall and improving soil moisture; scattered showers are expected to persist, leaving conditions broadly favourable or improving across most crop areas. In Argentina, a system earlier this week brought patchy rain outside the wetter north, and while soil moisture is still generally good after an active spring, rainfall is clearly running below normal and next week is forecast to be much drier, raising the risk that parts of the Pampas turn too dry for developing corn and soybeans if the pattern continues.
Across North America, cold risk and transport logistics are squarely on traders’ radar. A succession of clipper systems is bringing scattered precipitation and heavy snow to the Northern Plains and Midwest, followed by another intense shot of arctic air this weekend that could keep some areas below zero for a couple of days before more seasonable conditions return. The Central and Southern Plains will be mostly dry and slightly warmer until a strong cold front arrives Friday, while the Delta remains largely dry as multiple clippers pass to the north. The net effect is short-term disruption risk from snow and cold, offset by the benefit of accumulating snowpack that will slowly feed into the Mississippi River system over the winter, even as river levels currently continue to drift lower and keep barge freight costs in focus.
Further afield, Europe and Asia are also shaped by relatively benign but market-relevant weather patterns. Europe is set for a week of warmer-than-average temperatures with below-normal precipitation across most regions except the UK, Spain and Scandinavia, a configuration that supports winter wheat but could leave parts of the Balkans and Italy vulnerable if dryness persists. Asia is expected to see mostly near-normal to cooler temperatures over the next 15 days, with above-normal rainfall across Southeast and East Asia, including south China, South Korea and Japan, which is broadly favourable for winter crops but adds periodic logistics risk. Looking ahead, forecasters see La Niña fully dissipating between March and May, a transition that could raise spring dryness risks for US Midwest and Plains crops, Russian fields and coffee in Ethiopia and Vietnam, while increasing the odds of excessive moisture or spring flooding in southwest Europe, the North China Plain and Indonesia – all key watchpoints for new-crop prospects and freight flows.
In vegetable oils, Malaysia’s palm oil stocks have surged to a 6½-year high, adding pressure to that complex and indirectly to soyoil and rapeseed oil. November inventories climbed 13% month-on-month to 2.84 MMT, the highest since March 2019, as exports dropped 28.1% to 1.21 MMT and crude palm oil output slipped 5.3% to 1.94 MMT but still marked the strongest November production since 2017. With Indonesia cutting its December export tax on crude palm oil to $74 per ton from $124, Malaysia’s December exports are expected to stay under pressure, and total 2025 output is now likely to top 20 MMT for the first time, leaving benchmark palm futures near five-month lows after falling another 43 ringgit overnight. Combined with softer Chinese veg-oil futures and modest losses in Chinese January soyoil and palm contracts, these dynamics keep a lid on the veg-oil complex even as soyoil remains structurally firm year-to-date.
Finally, market structure and positioning are helping to shape today’s price action across grains and oilseeds. Overnight moves have SRW wheat down 2 cents, HRW down ½ cent, corn up ¼ cent and soybeans down 3 cents, while Chinese January agricultural futures show soybeans slightly higher but soymeal, soyoil, palm oil and corn all modestly lower, reflecting comfortable nearby supply and high inventories. Malaysian palm oil futures are off about 1.05%, and recent CME registration and open-interest data show new interest building in SRW, HRW, corn and soymeal while soybeans and soyoil see liquidation. Against this backdrop of ample global supply, aggressive Argentine tax cuts, record-high Indian acreage, heavy Malaysian palm stocks and evolving La Niña risks, today’s market remains fundamentally heavy but highly sensitive to incremental weather updates, policy shifts and export tenders.