Wheat futures turn up; cattle mixed

Market Line February 24, 2011 Wheat futures closed higher Wednesday with Kansas City the strongest market. There was early follow through selling from the previous session but then there was talk of the market being oversold.

There was also export news with Egypt buying another 115-thousand metric tons of U.S. wheat. There are also several tenders working with Saudi Arabia now in the mix.

Some pressure came yesterday from expectations of more moisture in China. Allen Motew of QT Weather for the Linn Group says winter wheat areas in China should get a good bit of rain.

Motew: “So the next five days will see substantial rain, two, three, four inch totals right across the drought of central China. It is going to fill reservoirs. It is going to help this area big time.”

On Wednesday Chicago March wheat up ¾ of a cent at 7-63. March corn up 11 ¾ cents at 6-91 ½. Portland soft white wheat by unit train only, mostly 7-78 with no comparison. Club wheat premium at Portland 17 cents. New crop August white wheat 7-25 to 7-70. Hard red winter 11.5 percent mixed at mostly 8-92. DNS 14% protein one to 11 cents higher at mostly 11-30.

Live cattle futures closed higher Wednesday with feeder contracts mostly lower. Higher boxed beef and thoughts of tightening supplies helped live contracts. Feeder contracts did rebound some based the late session move in live cattle. April live cattle up 32 cents at 113-97. March feeders down 35 at 128-85. March Class III milk down two cents at 18-75.

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

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