International grain prices continued to slip over the past week, mainly due to news that appears to increase access to products.

On Tuesday of last week, MATIF December wheat settled at €330/t.

This was down to €327.25/t on the following Friday, €324/t on Monday of this week and €319.50/t for Tuesday’s close.

Corridor negotiations

The recent AHDB report suggests that Russia is demanding that a Russian state bank be reconnected to the international SWIFT payment system as part of any extension of the Black Sea corridor to facilitate its exports of grain and fertiliser.

At the time of going to print, an extension to the deal had not been agreed and the existing one concludes this week.

WASDE impacts

Last week, the World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates (WASDE) report from the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) revised its wheat production upwards to 782.68Mt.

This came from higher production estimates for Australia, UK and Kazakhstan, despite reductions in Argentinian and EU production.

The report forecast a slight rise in demand, but the production increase was bigger with a slight increase in world ending stocks to 267.82Mt.

Some believe that the WASDE numbers are an overestimate on the supply side because of further recent reductions in the size of the Argentinian wheat crop.

Last week, the Rosario Grains Exchange reduced its wheat production forecast to 11.8Mt, from 14Mt a week earlier. The figure used in the WASDE report was 15.5Mt.

For maize, the WASDE report reduced global production to 1,168.39Mt. The reduction was a result of lower production numbers for the EU, southeast Asia and South Africa. This also meant a reduction in the world ending stocks estimate to 300.76Mt.

Production in the US itself was increased slightly to 353.84Mt (+890Kt), which was not anticipated by the trade.

Native prices

Imported maize price continued to drop this week, hitting €310/t. This will no doubt be a concern, as it looks competitive against wheat and barley.

Prices here remain quite volatile due to the weakening sentiment and lack of demand in the market.

Nearby prices for native wheat are hard to come by, but are around €335 to €340/t, with barley €10-€15/t below this.

Prices for 2023 are a bigger rarity and are about €310/t for wheat and €300/t for barley. These are dried prices.

November 2023 oilseed rape price on MATIF dropped to €618.25/t on Tuesday.