The Morning Vibe

13/04/12 -- The overnight grains are mostly a tad steadier, and the pound showing little change so far.

Last night's Chicago soybean close was the highest for a front month since the last day of August and came within 10 cents of the 2011 highest close of the year. At USD394.60 May 12 meal took out the 2011 highs.

As the South American soybean harvest progresses south production estimates keep dropping. It was southern Brazil and Argentina that bore the brunt of the drought you will recall. Some private estimates now put the Brazilian crop at 63-65 MMT, versus the USDA's 66 MMT from earlier in the week.

Argentina's crop was pegged at 44 MMT by the Buenos Aires Grain Exchange yesterday, 1 MMT below the USDA's Tuesday estimate, others I am hearing are now in the 41-42 MMT region.

Argentina's farmers will soon start winter wheat planting and are expected to reduce sowings by around 15% on last year due to low domestic prices.

Brussels I see weren't exactly rushed off their feet with paperwork this past week being only asked to issue 84 TMT of soft wheat export licences, the second lowest weekly total of the marketing year.

Algeria however bought 200,000 MT of optional origin wheat yesterday with France thought to be the most likely supplier.

With US winter wheat maturity 2-4 weeks ahead of schedule and corn/soybean prices where they are there's plenty of talk of double cropping with no-till corn or soybeans going into the ground immediately after the wheat harvest.

That could help get those soybean acres up a bit.