DTN Early Word Grains

6:00 a.m. CME Globex:

May corn was 3/4 cent higher, May soybeans were 9 cents higher, and July Kansas City (HRW) wheat was 7 1/2 cents higher.

CME Globex Recap:

Grain-related contracts paint the commodity board green early Wednesday with bullish leadership coming once again from soybean meal and K.C. wheat. Outside commodities are starting mixed after traders found hawkish sound bites in Tuesday's comments from the new Fed Chairman.

OUTSIDE MARKETS:

The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed 299.24 points (-1.2%) lower at 25,410.03, the NASDAQ Composite fell 91.11 points (-1.2%) to 7,330.35, and the S&P 500 dropped 35.32 points (-1.3%) to 2,744.28 Tuesday. DJIA futures were 12 points higher early Wednesday morning. Asian markets were lower with Japan's Nikkei 225 down 321.62 points (-1.4%), Hong Kong's Hang Seng down 423.94 points (-1.4%), and China's Shanghai Composite down 32.66 points (-1.0%). European markets were also lower with London's FTSE 100 down 22.62 points (-0.3%), Germany's DAX down 35.40 points (-0.3%), and France's CAC 40 down 23.15 points (-0.4%). The euro was 0.0021 lower at 1.2231 while the U.S. dollar index gained 0.10 to 90.47. March 30-year T-Bonds were 9/32 higher at 143'27 while April gold gained $2.30 to $1,320.90. Crude oil was $0.07 lower at $62.94 and Brent crude was down $0.08 to $66.55. China's Dalian soybean were higher and Malaysian palm oil futures were up 0.7% overnight.

	BULL		BEAR
1)	Corn prices keep pushing higher with ongoing support from Argentina's dry weather and in line with their seasonal trend.	1)	River closures due to flooding are making it difficult to move grain to New Orleans.
2)	November soybeans found another new contract high Tuesday, along with a new high in May soybean meal.	2)	So far in 2017-18, U.S. shipments of corn, soybeans, and wheat are all down from a year ago.
3)	Commercial buying emerged Tuesday to bolster the uptrend in K.C. wheat.	3)	The world still has plenty of old-crop wheat supplies.

The weekly Newsom on the Market column can be found on subscription sites only. On DTN Pro it is in News/Town Hall and on MyDTN in News/Columns.

MORE COMMODITY-SPECIFIC COMMENTS

CORN May corn is up 3/4 cent early Wednesday, maintaining a gradual upward path and near its highest prices in five months with ongoing support from another dry forecast for Argentina. Wednesday morning's satellite map shows light showers across Argentina, but overall amounts are expected to be too light to offer crops much help the next seven days. Here in the U.S., more rain is expected in the Delta and eastern Midwest the next couple days, keeping river levels high and disrupting the ability to get U.S. corn to ships in New Orleans. While plenty of U.S. corn sits in storage, May corn continues to trend gradually higher, helped by dry conditions in Argentina.

SOYBEANS May soybeans are up 9 cents early, taking another shot at trading above the old July high of $10.53 with ongoing concerns of dry weather in Argentina, as described above. While old-crop soybeans have been reluctant to take out their old highs, May soybean meal is having no problem trading higher, finding itself up $9.20 at $398.40 early Wednesday, another new 18-month high for spot meal. On the bearish side, a 4.1 billion bushel soybean crop on the way from Brazil and lagging U.S. soybean export business are legitimate concerns, but it is difficult to see any trader recognition of those factors. For now, May soybeans and meal continue to trend higher with problems in the world's largest exporter of soybean meal stealing the spotlight.

WHEAT July K.C. wheat is trading up 7 1/2 cents early, showing no sign of stopping yet after posting a new six-month high on Tuesday. The main bullish concern of course, is this winter's drought in the western U.S. Plains, followed more recently by flooding concerns in the southeastern Midwest. The seven-day forecast is not offering much help with only light precipitation expected in the western Plains and more rain slated for the eastern Midwest. Here at the end of February, it has been a bullish surprise for winter wheat to see so much buying interest this early in the year. Fundamentally, there is plenty of old-crop winter wheat available, but the ongoing drought has punished shorts for their bearishness and continues to support uptrends in Chicago and K.C. contracts.

	DTN Cash	Change From	National	Contract	Change from
Commodity	Index	Prev Day	Avg. Basis	Month	Prev Day
Corn:	$3.42	$0.02	-$0.29	Mar	$0.004
Soybeans:	$9.70	$0.04	-$0.68	Mar	$0.004
SRW Wheat:	$4.37	$0.05	-$0.26	Mar	$0.011
HRW Wheat:	$4.49	$0.13	-$0.40	Mar	$0.015
HRS Wheat:	$5.86	$0.01	-$0.11	Mar	$0.007

Todd Hultmancan be reached at todd.hultman@dtn.com

Todd can be followed throughout the day on Twitter @ToddHultman1

(KR)

Copyright 2018 DTN/The Progressive Farmer. All rights reserved.