Canada Markets

PDQinfo.ca's daily price data for the Southeast Saskatchewan region, randomly chosen from the southern prairie regions producing durum, shows the bid as of Jan. 25 falling for seven consecutive days, a move that has seen price drop by $39.80/metric ton to $449.75/mt. PDQ's Jan. 26 price data shows a mixed close across the Prairies, which includes a modest $0.94/mt increase in the southeast Saskatchewan bid.

At the same time, Jan. 26 bids include a sharp $8.43/mt jump in the southern Alberta bid, the first increase in six sessions and the largest daily increase since Nov. 1. Southern Alberta's proximity to the West Coast comes to mind and this bears watching.

As seen on the attached chart, the January weakness saw price breach the 38.2% retracement of the move from the crop year low in September to the Nov. 7 high at $498.02/mt. Additional potential support lies at the 50% retracement, calculated at $441.66/mt.

It is interesting to note that this week's European Union data shows the cash price for durum at Sevilla, Spain at EUR 453/mt, unchanged from the previous week while close to the weakest trade seen since the week-ending Dec. 1 when price was reported at EUR 500/mt. The price for Bologna, Italy was reported EUR 10/mt lower this week at EUR 460/mt, down from a recent high of EUR 493/mt reached in mid-November. Meanwhile, the E.U. reports Canada's No. 1 CWAD at $455/mt USD FOB the St. Lawrence as of Jan. 17, while the month/month change is shown at 0%. Cash offers in the export sector appear to be holding steady in Canada while cash bids to the grower are sliding lower.

While the Canadian Grain Commission's week 25 data is not available at the time of writing, week 24 data shows commercial stocks of durum at 693,200 mt in Canada, down 28% from one year ago while 13.8% lower that the five-year average for this week.

Cliff Jamieson can be reached at cliff.jamieson@dtn.com

Follow him on Twitter @Cliff Jamieson

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