The markets were on fire this past week fueled by a USDA report and postponed tariffs. May and July futures each ended the week 30 cents higher while December futures closed 17 higher. The funds are rolling back into the commodities as they ended the week long 161,184 corn contracts and are now long 2,666 soybean contracts. This is the first time the funds have been long soybeans in over a month.
On Wednesday President Trump abruptly paused part of his tariff assault on global trading partners, dialing back duty rates on goods from many countries for 90 days to allow room to negotiate lower trade barriers. One country he didn’t dial back was China where he raised tariffs to 125%. China countered his tariffs by implementing their own tariff on US goods to 125% which resulted in Trump increasing their tariff to 145%. I look for this game of chicken to continue until someone gets caught without something they need from the other because their consumers can’t afford it.
On Thursday the USDA released their April Crop Production report. There were not many surprises, but we did see ending stocks decrease due to adjustments in exports that we have witnessed over the last few months. They increased the export program by 100 million bushels in this report. Even with this increase there are many traders that feel it could be increased another 100-125 million bushels. The question remains if our export program has been front loaded due to the tariffs. My opinion is that we will not continue at the current pace and once the South American stocks are more readily available, we will see a sharp decline.
USDA 2024/25 US Carryout (billion bushels)
| USDA April 2025 | Average Trade Estimate | USDA March 2025 | |
| Corn | 1.465 | 1.510 | 1.540 |
| Soybeans | .375 | .379 | .380 |
| Wheat | .846 | .825 | .819 |
USDA 2024/25 World Carryout (Million Tonnes)
| USDA April 2025 | Average Trade Estimate | USDA March 2025 | |
| Corn | 287.65 | 288.20 | 288.90 |
| Soybeans | 122.47 | 122.10 | 121.40 |
| Wheat | 260.70 | 260.40 | 260.10 |
We witnessed this past week that any sign of hope that tariffs will be reduced is immediately met by sharp upside price action. I think this is a sign of what is possible if President Trump can pull this off. I don’t know how long and painful the process might be, but the outlook is bearish if he is able to come to agreements with our major trade partners. We could see increased exports and much stronger markets.
The lower carryout in last Thursday’s report has resulted in a stocks/use ratio of 9.6%. Historically anytime we drop below 10% stocks to use, the CBOT trades in the five-dollar range. Look for the market to continue its climb to this level in the May and July contracts.
Upcoming reports
| Date | Report |
| 4/14/2025 | Crop Progress |
| 4/18/2025 | No markets – Good Friday |
| 5/12/2025 | Crop Production |
