USDA Reports Preview

At 11 a.m. CDT on Friday, July 10, USDA will be back with their latest World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates (WASDE) report, adding context to the acreage and stocks data served up back on June 30.

CORN

After trading to new contract lows the last week of June, corn futures have finally shown some life over the past five sessions with traders seeing the need for weather risk premium ahead of a critical month for corn pollination across the U.S. On Friday, USDA will offer a fundamental update, though traders may be quick to look past the numbers in favor of a focus on weather given the time of year.

Beginning with the old-crop balance sheet, the 13 firms surveyed by Dow Jones are calling, on average, for a decline in 2025-26 corn ending stocks to 2.077 billion bushels (bb). Once again, corn exports are in the spotlight and a favorite for a bullish revision on Friday. Export commitments are running 25% ahead of the same point in 2025 as of late June with USDA's forecast as of the June WASDE calling for only a 16% year-over-year increase in exports. Meanwhile, corn usage for ethanol may be an area of concern and an offsetting cut to demand with year-to-date usage running 1.3% ahead of the 2024-25 marketing year, but USDA anticipating a 2.6% increase as of the June WASDE. Either way, I believe the changes would be offsetting with my personal estimate for 2025-26 ending corn stocks at 2.025 bb.

Looking ahead to the new-crop (2026-27) year, it is unlikely USDA will adjust their yield forecast of 183 bushels per acre (bpa) on Friday. In fact, USDA has done so in the July WASDE only five times since 2000, the last example in 2023 after a particularly dry June. Using the June 30 harvested acreage forecast of 87.4 million acres, production will likely land very close to 16 bb. This would be up slightly from June as a result of fractionally higher area. It may be too soon to expect any changes to the demand side of the balance sheet, especially if such minor changes result to supply. However, given the lower beginning stocks (2025-26 ending stocks), it seems likely 2026-27 corn stocks could drop to below 1.9 bb in Friday's update. While not necessarily a bullish number, it does add a layer of intrigue to the corn yield story ahead of the pollination period.

For world corn, the area of interest will certainly be the European Union, as historic heat and drought has slashed corn conditions in France with some calling for upward of 30-40% year-over-year yield declines. It will be interesting to get USDA's take this Friday. Otherwise, the report should be quiet. With harvest well underway in South America and record crops already expected, the Dow Jones survey is calling for another modest upward revision to Brazil and Argentina's production in 2026. However, world reserves are expected to contract (both for old- and new-crop balance sheets), driven by changes to the U.S. and perhaps cuts in Europe as well.

SOYBEANS

The soybean market over the past five sessions has been a testament to how quickly the winds can shift when weather uncertainty is added to the mix. Optimism for increased Chinese demand has traders currently uneasy regarding the U.S. balance sheet with little room for error in growing the 2026 crop to accommodate the potential demand rebound should China honor the volume commitments reported by the White House. Friday's numbers may serve to further stress how important growing season weather will be through the coming 60 or so days.

For the old-crop 2025-26 balance sheet, I expect a quiet report on Friday. At this point with soybean crush for the September through May period now running almost even with USDA's pace as of the June WASDE, we may see USDA pause their recent string of increases to that category. However, as an added twist it now seems plausible USDA is underestimating 2025-26 exports with commitments now running ahead of USDA's forecast as of late June. In fact, commitments totaled 1.509 bb in the most recent export sales report, just 1 million bushels (mb) behind the full year USDA goal. The average trade guess for Friday according to the Dow Jones survey is 337 mb of soybean ending stocks by the end of August, while my personal forecast is 335 mb, so directly in line with the consensus.

For the new-crop 2026-27 outlook, USDA will very likely leave their soybean yield forecast unchanged from June at 53 bpa. USDA has changed the yield from June to July only four times since 2000. Using the harvest area forecast from the June 30 report of 84.4 million acres, suggests production of 4.473 bb. This would be up less than 1% from the June forecast. The demand side is a little more difficult to anticipate, given how early it still is. The argument can be made that USDA could be underestimating exports with new-crop sales more than doubling over the past month. However, open sales sit at only 88.9 mb, still a historically slow start even with China making their first purchases in mid-June. The result for Friday may be at least a temporary increase to the 2026-27 forecast for soybean ending stocks from the 310 mb June forecast. The above math would suggest somewhere near 340 mb with the Dow Jones survey calling for 324 mb. I don't believe traders would find this overly bearish. With just a 1-bpa cut to yield equaling over 80 mb to the bottom line and the most important soybean development window still ahead, the balance sheet remains very sensitive to production changes even without demand changes this time around.

Given the time of year, changes to the world soybean balance sheet should be minimal. Analysts surveyed by Dow Jones are expecting slight increases to both 2025-26 and 2026-27 reserves with the changes likely to be the result of fine tuning of world numbers by USDA.

WHEAT

After a steep selloff through late May and June, wheat futures have also begun to mount a comeback over the past five sessions, spurred by a surprise additional cut to 2026 U.S. wheat acreage in last week's update from USDA. On Friday, look for USDA to incorporate last week's numbers while also giving traders another glimpse into the world wheat situation.

Beginning with the old-crop 2025-26 balance sheet, USDA found in their June survey 920 mb of wheat were in U.S. inventories as of June 1. USDA will now fit their demand to meet this estimate in Friday's update. With USDA's export estimate (910 mb) already stretched above both the Foreign Ag Service's accounting in early June (860 mb) and the Census Bureau's findings (888 mb), it seems unlikely the revision will come here. Instead, feed and residual may be increased by 15 mb to explain the slightly lower-than-expected June 1 supplies.

For the current 2026-27 marketing year, USDA forecast only 32.06 million acres of wheat will be harvested in the U.S. this year -- the lowest in almost 150 years. The national average wheat yield is, of course, also subject to change on Friday. Assuming the 47-bpa yield is unaltered, the acreage drop alone would point to a 1.507-bb wheat crop, the smallest since 1970 if realized. With the aforementioned cut to beginning stocks (2025-26 ending stocks), it's possible 2026-27 U.S. wheat stocks could fall below 700 mb for the first time since 2023-24. This is also assuming no changes are made to the demand picture, although exports are off to a very slow start and behind USDA's expected pace one month into the year. The Dow Jones survey is slightly more conservative in estimates with analysts on average expecting a 1.524 bb U.S. total wheat crop and 710 mb of 2026-27 ending stocks.

On Friday, traders will be interested to see how a historically low U.S. wheat output in 2026 fits into the world picture. Given the extended heatwave in Europe, production forecasts there will be of interest. Russia's production and export forecasts, being the largest exported crop in the world, will also be significant. Overall, traders will be interested to see if the expected year-over-year production declines in several key countries make a meaningful dent in world reserves which ballooned in 2025. For Friday, analysts are expecting slight cuts to both 2025-26 and 2026-27 world wheat stocks, likely to be driven by cuts to the U.S., E.U., and potentially Canada after Statistics Canada found 6% less wheat area to be planted in 2026 as compared to 2025.

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Join us for DTN's post-report webinar at 12:30 p.m. CDT on Friday, July 10, as we discuss USDA's new estimates in light of recent market events. Questions are welcome, and registrants will receive a replay link for viewing at their convenience. Register here for Friday's USDA WASDE webinar: https://www.dtn.com/….

U.S. PRODUCTION (Million Bushels) 2026-27
	Jul	Avg	High	Low	Jun
Corn		15,967	16,000	15,852	15,995
Soybeans		4,457	4,481	4,430	4,435
All Wheat		1,524	1,568	1,498	1,561
Winter		1,002	1,030	968	1,030
HRW		480	496	445	497
SRW		293	300	279	300
White		229	235	209	233
U.S. ENDING STOCKS (Million Bushels) 2025-26
	Jul	Avg	High	Low	Jun
Corn		2,077	2,151	1,990	2,145
Soybeans		337	350	312	340
Wheat		927	945	920	935
U.S. ENDING STOCKS (Million Bushels) 2026-27
	Jul	Avg	High	Low	Jun
Corn		1,855	1,963	1,542	1,960
Soybeans		324	358	270	310
Wheat		710	744	680	744
WORLD ENDING STOCKS (million metric tons) 2025-26
	Jul	Avg	High	Low	Jun
Corn		302.9	304.0	301.7	303.4
Soybeans		125.7	126.0	125.4	125.5
Wheat		279.6	280.0	278.5	280.0
WORLD ENDING STOCKS (million metric tons) 2026-27
	Jul	Avg	High	Low	Jun
Corn		279.0	283.0	271.0	281.2
Soybeans		125.2	126.2	124.0	124.9
Wheat		273.2	275.1	270.0	275.4
WORLD PRODUCTION (million metric tons) 2025-26
	Jul	Avg	High	Low	Jun
CORN
Argentina		61.5	62.0	60.5	61.0
Brazil		138.3	139.0	137.5	138.0
SOYBEANS
Argentina		50.1	51.0	50.0	50.0
Brazil		180.3	182.1	180.0	180.0

Rhett Montgomery can be reached at rhett.montgomery@dtn.com

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