Mark's Market Talk for May 5, 2025

Not much new news from last week. Corn and beans both closed the week lower. July corn was down 16 cents and December was down 5. Our strong corn exports are starting to slow as end users are bought up and the larger oversea buyers are waiting for cheaper corn from South America later this summer. The funds have a moderate long position, and we have a 30 cent July to September inverse to deal with. That can cause hedgers to lose some hair as they navigate that spread. All you can do if you own the physical grain is either unload by July or hope the August basis is strong enough to overcome the inverse. Crude oil closed lower for the week which is good for consumers, but not so good for corn and bean producers. Beans were lower last week but not near what corn was. July beans closed down 1 cent while November was down 4 cents. Bean planting is running at a normal pace right now and it is too early to talk about delays. The talk is with the early corn planting going well, we may see even more corn acres than expected which would come at the expense of bean acres. However, with the price of crude and bean oil falling, less bean acres may not be enough to raise prices. The tariff talk might have stabilized a bit last week. Reports are that several countries have come forward wanting to talk. China and the US continue to play cat and mouse with both sides saying the other has called while denying that they made the first call. It appears both are concerned that it will make them look weak if they make the first call. Most of us got over that once we left junior high. We got into high school and discovered girls wanted to be asked out. Now that was over 50 years ago for me, I think times have changed and now the girl may call first.