Small gains for wheat futures; stocks hit cattle contracts

Market Line April 28, 2010 Wheat futures gained a few cents Tuesday. Traders generally pointed to buying by spreaders of wheat versus corn. There is also some unneeded rain in the forecast later this week for the Plains and the Midwestern soft red winter wheat belt.

There were some cold temperatures in the Plains yesterday morning and USDA meteorologist Brad Rippey says more may be in the offing.

Rippey: “We do expect some freezes late in the week across the high plains region so once again we will have to keep an eye on that developing wheat crop.”

On Tuesday Chicago July wheat was up 2 ½ cents at 4-90 ½. July corn down 5 ¾ cents at 3-53 ¾. Portland soft white wheat remained steady at mostly 4-82. New crop August soft white unchanged at 4-80 to 4-85. Club wheat premium mostly $2. HRW 11.5 % protein two to four cents higher at 5-37. DNS 14% protein mixed at mostly 6-74. No Portland barley bids.

After starting higher on strong beef prices cattle futures closed Tuesday with triple digit losses. The large drop in the stock market had traders nervous about consumer demand for beef. Profit taking and fund selling were cited.

June live cattle down 177 at 93-72. August feeders down 102 at 115-92.

June Class III milk up 19 cents at $14 on optimism about cheese prices.

I’m Bob Hoff and that’s Market Line on Northwest Aginfo Net.

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