Coronavirus Concerns Continue to Impact Markets

Tim Hammerich

News Reporter

Coronavirus fears continued to affect the ag markets yesterday. From the floor of the CME in Chicago, here’s Scott Shellady.

Shellady… “This is still gonna be a coronavirus story. We're going to try to fix this with other things outside the market. Cut interest rates, all the things that the government can do monetarily. But I don't think that's going to really matter. What's going to get people out of their houses and what's going to get people to come put money back into this economy is a way to treat the virus and or a vaccine. So you can do whatever you like, but it's not going to bring mom and pop out of the house and send them to a football game. Period. And I think that's what you really have to keep an eye on here. When those number of cases start to dwindle like they have in China, then the market will take some comfort from that and there'll be more money that comes back into play.”

Chicago May Wheat futures closed up just a half cent to $5.18 ½.

Kansas City Hard Red Winter Wheat down $0.07 to $4.46 ¼.

May Corn closed down $0.03 ¼ to $3.81 ½.

Portland prices for soft white wheat of ordinary protein unchanged yesterday still ranging from $5.93 to $6.00.

Club Wheat of Ordinary Protein also unchanged ranging from $5.93 to $7.75.

Dark Northern Spring wheat prices down $0.07 ranging from $5.61 ¼ to $5.76 ¼ for 14% protein.

The technicals looked good on Live Cattle futures yesterday, but that sure didn’t help us today. That market down $2.62 ½ on the April board to $108.65. Feeder Cattle down $1.90 to $133.65.

Class III milk yesterday up a nickel to $16.06.