Wheat
Chicago SRW December 2025 wheat comes into Friday’s session with a reference level of $5.29/bu, after a small pre-holiday gain, with nearby wheat contracts up roughly three-quarters of a cent for the week so far and modestly lower on the month and year to date. US wheat futures reopened after the holiday with slightly firmer SRW trade, weaker spring wheat and steady to higher HRW, as open interest in SRW fell by nearly 5,900 contracts, pointing to some short-covering and position-squaring. In the background, EU fundamentals remain heavy but constructive: FranceAgriMer reports 98% of the French soft wheat crop planted with 97% rated good/excellent, while the European Commission has nudged 2025/26 EU wheat output up to 134.2 MMT and ending stocks to 11.5 MMT. Argentina adds extra supply pressure with its 2025/26 wheat crop now seen at a record 25.5 MMT, supported by better-than-expected yields and recent above-normal rains.
Corn
Chicago December 2025 corn starts Friday with a reference price of $4.31¾/bu, after a strong pre-holiday rally of 7–8 cents that left weekly gains near 7¾ and trimmed part of the year-to-date 5.8% decline in nearby contracts. Market positioning shows a heavy roll out of December and into March, with open interest down more than 29,000 contracts overall and December alone shedding over 64,000 lots, while the national US cash corn average last printed around $4.04/bu. Ethanol remains a key support: weekly DOE data show near-record US ethanol output at 1.113 million bpd, stocks down 1.5% to 21.97 million barrels and slightly softer exports, an energy-linked demand backdrop that keeps corn tied closely to fuel markets going into December.
Soybeans
January 2026 soybeans enter the Friday session with a reference level of $11.31½/bu, up 6¾ cents on Wednesday and roughly 6½ cents firmer for the week, extending a much stronger year-to-date performance of about +13.3% for nearby contracts. US futures saw fresh length added ahead of the holiday, with open interest up more than 10,800 lots, while the national average US cash bean price firmed to $10.59¾/bu; soymeal was mixed and soyoil 32–57 points higher, tracking strength in the wider veg-oil complex. In China, January 2026 agricultural futures added to the bullish tone with soybeans, soymeal and soyoil all higher, even as US traders await fresh Export Sales data for the week to October 16 and monitor new Brazilian crop and trade headlines that will drive the next leg of price action.
Turkey, Russia and Black Sea wheat flows back in focus
Turkish state buyer TMO has resumed purchases of Russian wheat for the first time since February 2023, booking 300,000 t from United Grain Company on a C&F basis after two bumper domestic harvests had allowed Turkey to step away from imports. With Turkey’s own crop down to 17.9 MMT in 2025/26 from 19 MMT a year earlier and 21 MMT in 2023/24, the return of TMO to the import market re-signals official demand into the Black Sea export corridor at the same time as Russia has lifted its floating wheat export duty by 14.6% to 232.3 RUB/t, even as barley and corn remain duty-free. The combination of renewed Turkish state buying, higher Russian duties, China opening to Russian wheat bran and continuing commercial Russian flows to Turkey and Egypt reinforces Black Sea wheat’s central role in pricing global milling wheat.
Record South American wheat and soy reshape the supply outlook
South America continues to add hefty volumes to the export balance sheet. Argentina’s 2025/26 wheat harvest is now forecast at a record 25.5 MMT, above the previous 22.4 MMT high from 2021/22, helped by higher-than-expected yields and recent abundant rains in key central areas. At the same time, soybean planting in Argentina has reached 36% of a planned 17.6 million ha, while corn is 39.3% planted with 82% of fields rated good to excellent, underlining the region’s capacity to ship large volumes of wheat, corn, soybeans, oil and meal into world markets once the season advances. As the world’s largest exporter of soybean oil and meal and the third-largest corn exporter, Argentina’s weather and harvest trajectory remain critical variables for global feed and crush margins.
Brazil’s soybean juggernaut accelerates despite weather noise
Brazil is on track for another record soybean crop. Agroconsult pegs 2025/26 production at 178.1 MMT, with planted area up 2.1% to 48.8 million ha and around 85% of the crop already in the ground, some of which could be ready for export as early as January. Itaú BBA echoes that view with a similar 178 MMT forecast, above USDA’s 175 MMT projection, even though La Niña-linked irregular rains have forced localized replanting of up to 4% of area in some regions. Analysts still see generally “benevolent” weather and positive maps for central Brazil in coming weeks, and Agroconsult expects Brazilian soybean exports to reach 109.1 MMT this year and 112 MMT next year, consolidating Brazil’s position as top supplier to China and an anchor for global soy availability.
China’s contamination halt hits Brazilian soy, shifts trade flows
Against this backdrop of record Brazilian supply, China has temporarily halted soybean imports from five Brazilian crushing and export plants owned by major multinationals, after inspectors detected wheat grains treated with pesticides mixed into cargoes. The suspensions hit units of Cargill, Louis Dreyfus, CHS and Tres Tentos, but affect only a handful of the more than 2,000 Brazilian entities registered to export to China, so volumes can be rerouted via other plants. Traders are already assessing how to handle cargoes on the water, including potential resale to alternative destinations. The episode comes as China continues to buy Brazilian soybeans but has also resumed purchasing US beans, with wire reports of 10–15 additional US cargoes for January shipment, underlining how quickly Chinese demand can pivot between origins in response to quality, logistics and policy shocks.
Corn balances hinge on Brazil, Argentina, South Africa and Ukraine
Corn fundamentals are being pulled in different directions by multiple origins. In Argentina, early 2025/26 corn crops are currently in excellent shape thanks to high soil moisture and near-normal temperatures, but LSEG’s four-week and seasonal outlooks flag rising drought risk across key provinces such as Córdoba, San Luis and parts of Santa Fe into January–February, even as planting progress lags last year slightly. Brazil’s 2025/26 corn crop has been trimmed to 138.6 MMT on the back of increasing drought concerns in southern regions, where dryness since early October may persist through December, though rains in the Southeast and Goiás should speed first-crop planting. South Africa, meanwhile, has likely produced its second-largest corn crop on record at 16.4 MMT and plans to expand 2026 corn area to 2.67 million ha, while also boosting soy plantings to a record 1.18 million ha amid favorable rain forecasts. Adding to this, Ukraine expects its 2025 grain harvest to climb to at least 60 MMT, with 19–20 MMT of oilseeds, reinforcing the Black Sea’s role in both corn and oilseed trade flows.
Veg-oil complex steered by Indonesian and Malaysian palm moves
Palm oil developments continue to feed back into global veg-oil and oilseed pricing. Indonesia’s palm oil exports fell sharply in September to 2.2 MMT from 3.47 MMT in August, on the back of lower output and softer domestic consumption, but suppliers have now deferred at least 310,000 t of November shipments into early December in anticipation of a cut of more than $50/t in export tax as Jakarta recalibrates levies off a lower reference price. The deferrals, equivalent to roughly 12% of typical monthly exports, are expected to swell December shipments and could support Bursa Malaysia futures, which recently hit a four-month low before rebounding to around 4,114 ringgit. At the same time, Malaysia’s palm oil exports to China are down almost 29% year-to-date, highlighting competitive pressure from other origins and oils, all of which interacts with soyoil pricing and crush margins for soybeans and other oilseeds.
Weather risk matrix: Black Sea dryness, US winter storms and South American shifts
Weather remains a critical driver of risk premia. Forecasts call for abnormally warm and increasingly dry conditions across parts of the Black Sea, with Hungary, Ukraine and southwest Russia already facing exceptionally low soil moisture and limited rainfall in coming weeks, while above-normal temperatures delay winter wheat dormancy. In North America, a succession of systems is bringing heavy snow, blizzard conditions and arctic air to the Northern Plains, Midwest and Central/Southern Plains, likely ending remaining fieldwork and pushing US winter wheat into dormancy, even as extra precipitation supports Mississippi River water levels and barge logistics out of the Delta. South America presents a mixed picture: Brazil’s central and northern belt stays showery but overall drier than normal into early December, while Argentina shifts into a drier pattern after heavy rain, with soil moisture currently high but trending lower, a set-up that could worsen if heat arrives later.
US policy, ethanol and positioning add macro layers to price action
On the macro side, DOE data showing ethanol stocks down 1.5% to 21.968 million barrels and near-record production at 1.113 million bpd underpin US corn demand through the biofuel channel, even as export sales updates are awaited after recent USDA reporting delays. US grain markets were closed for the overnight session due to the holiday, but weekly, monthly and year-to-date performance tables still highlight soy strength versus softer wheat and corn, while open-interest data confirm a significant reshuffling of positions across all major grain and oilseed contracts. In the US policy arena, Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins signaled that farm relief payments should begin to flow in early January, potentially easing near-term cash-flow stress for producers. In China, the creation of Shanghai Guomao Holding, a large state-owned commodity trading house with 13 billion yuan in capital and a mandate across physical and derivatives markets, is designed to boost the influence of “Shanghai prices” in global commodities – a development that over time could reshape liquidity and price discovery in grains and oilseeds alongside metals and energy.