03/19/07 India may import wheat

Market Line March 19, 2007 Wheat futures closed higher Friday in what some traders said was an over due bounce. Wheat generally followed corn higher. A private estimate for corn acreage was friendly and a spring wheat acreage projection was seen as neutral to friendly. Also possibly supportive for wheat was Indian officials saying India could import up to three million tons of wheat "if needed." Some of India's wheat crop may have suffered storm damage recently. Ryan Kilbrantz of ADMIS at the Minneapolis Grain Exchange comments on what he expects to influence grain futures. Kilbrantz: "We do have the outside markets continuing to be a major force in price action and I expect that to continue. Watch weather patterns in the major U.S. growing areas as well and they should impact prices. And we are going to wait for the USDA to release their acreage intentions report. That will be out on March 30th. On Friday Chicago May wheat was up 5 ¼ cents at 4-60 ¾. May corn up 1 ¾ at 3-99 ½. Portland cash soft white wheat two cents higher at mostly 5-67. Club wheat 5-67. August new crop soft white three to six cents higher at 5-01. HRW 11.5 percent protein up seven cents at 5-80. Dark northern spring 14% protein seven to 12 cents higher at 5-94. Barley at the coast 170 dollars a ton. August at 152. Cattle futures were sharply lower Friday. Live contracts suffered from the loss of technical support and falling beef cutout values which had hit a three year high earlier in the week. April live cattle down 195 at 97-10. April feeders down 115 at 106-05. April Class III milk up a dime at 15-30. USDA Friday pegged February milk production in the 23 major states up nine-tenths of a percent from February of 2006. I'm Bob Hoff and that's Market Line on the Northwest Ag Information Network. Now this.