Mark's Market Talk for July 7, 2025

The USDA acreage and stocks report released last Monday was about as neutral as possible. There were some small pluses and minuses, but at the end of the day not much changed. As normal with a neutral report we saw some down pressure on Monday. Corn and beans recovered in the other 3 trading days and both ended the week higher. December corn closed 10 cents higher and November beans were 24 cents higher. Trade talks were part of the optimism as we came to an agreement with Vietnam. Granted they are not a huge trading partner, but it is a start. Later last week the rumors started that China is ready to talk. That news pushed us higher on Wednesday and Thursday. This would be very positive news; however, they have already sourced most of their immediate needs so we would be looking at future trade. China has worked hard to replace our ag products with imports from other countries, especially South America. Our trump card with them should be the massive number of Chinese products we import into our country. Their industries quickly saw the effect of our trade war as their products almost quit coming into America recently. We need to hold fast with them to ensure we work toward a more equal trade policy. Otherwise, the weather in our major grain producing areas remain non-threatening. Record or near record yields will put more pressure on prices. Meanwhile input costs are increasing as fertilizer prices continue to work higher. The Middle East war has impacted nitrogen prices as that area is a major producer. Phosphorus prices have worked higher due to supply issues and our tariff policies. To date potash has held mostly stable, but we need to see a trade agreement with Canada for this to continue. We will need to keep our pencils sharpened to make this year work.