News
19.01.2010
Corn Gains as Weaker Dollar, Last Week’s Slump Attract Buyers
Corn futures rose as a weaker dollar and the biggest weekly decline in 13 months attracted investors and importers. Wheat and soybeans also advanced.
The dollar weakened for a second day against a basket of six major currencies, extending yesterday’s 0.3 percent loss and making U.S. supplies cheaper for importers. Nonghyup Feed Inc., South Korea’s biggest buyer of feed grains, bought 165,000 tons of corn for delivery between May and June, said two industry executives who took part in the bidding yesterday.
“The grain market is oversold at the moment,” Tetsu Emori, a fund manager at Astmax Co. Ltd. in Tokyo, said by phone today. “Some of the short-covering is coming in,” he said, referring to investors closing bets on any further decline in prices.
March-delivery corn climbed as much as 1 percent to $3.7525 a bushel in after-hours trading on the Chicago Board of Trade, and traded at $3.735 at 2:02 p.m. Singapore time. Prices dropped 12 percent in five straight daily declines last week.
Speculative net-long positions, the difference between investors’ orders to buy and sell corn, reached an 18-month high during the four weeks ended Jan. 12, according to the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission data. Short positions, or bets prices will fall, reached a three-year low in the week ended Dec. 29.
March-delivery wheat rose as much as 1 percent to $5.1525 a bushel and last traded at $5.115. It lost 10 percent last week. March-delivery soybeans gained 0.4 percent to $9.7825 a bushel at 2:07 p.m. Singapore time, after losing 4.7 percent last week.
Rice for March delivery advanced as much as 1.2 percent to $14.135 per 100 pounds and last traded at $14.095.
The Philippines, the biggest rice importer, may lose as much as 400,000 tons of its first crop this year as El Nino weather conditions reduce rainfall, Joel Rudinas, acting agriculture undersecretary for operations, said yesterday.
Bloomberg
