Early Call On Chicago

03/10/11 -- The overnight grains finished with corn down 10-14 cents, beans 10-11 cents lower and wheat 2-4 cents weaker. NYMEX crude is down a dollar and a half as more Greek worries emerge after they announced that they were set to miss deficit targets at the end of the year.

Money continues to pour out of commodities, including grains. ANZ Bank say that spec money reduced their longs in US agrimarkets by almost half in the week to Sept 27th.

The head of the Russian Grain Union now says that the country will harvest 93 MMT of grains this year, pegging export potential at around 25 MMT of the 30 MMT surplus that they have for sale.

The Kazakh harvest meanwhile stands at 22.2 MMT so far, 86% up on last year's final total with 13% of the planted area still to be cut.

The hangover from Friday's bearish USDA report continues, with corn falling to 9 1/2 month lows having apparently endured it's largest one month fall in fifteen years in September.

Prospects look promising for the southern Plains winter wheat planting and early growth with "the most significant rain this area has seen in months" in the forecast a week from now, with a secondary dose showing up in the 11-15 day prognosis, according to WxRisk.

Early calls for this afternoon's CBOT session: corn down 12-14 cents, beans down 10-12 cents and wheat 2-4 cents lower.