Week Ending 8/28/2026

Reports from multiple crop tours (Pro Farmer being the largest) over the past week continue to indicate a crop that is not as big as last year and below the USDA’s current evaluation. Adding to the bullish news were reports that Russia was looking to intensify its attacks. The net result was a corn market that closed 28 cents higher in the December and March contracts while May closed 27 cents higher. The funds ended the week long 407,448 corn contracts and long 250,679 soybean contracts. This is the longest position the funds have held in corn since February 2025. Their current long position puts them in the 98^th percentile over the last year (98% of the time they have been below this level), indicating that a correction is in play.

Mid last week reports surfaced that Russia and Ukraine were in talks, but those talks fell apart or hit a dead end. The sources claimed that Russia was contemplating intensifying its ballistic missile attacks on the capitol and other vulnerable infrastructure in other cities. Russia is the worlds largest exporter of wheat while Ukraine is the worlds fourth largest exporter of corn. The possibility of losing millions of bushels of exports from either side pushed funds to add to their longs. The funds added over 80,000 contracts of corn, 40,000 soybeans and 25,000 contracts of soybeans following that news.

Harvest progress ratings remain ahead of pace for corn doughing (86%), denting (45%) and maturity (6%).

Many private analysts are predicting corn will trade above $6 per bushel. While there’s always the possibility, I’m not sure the market advances much further from here without some fundamental news. Prices should start to level out here as the funds are extremely long at this point. War rallies can be taken away quickly as we’ve seen in the past and we are still just speculating on the crop size as it will be several months before we know the final number. I would not be surprised to see the USDA make a small adjustment to yield in its September 11^th report but caution any bulls that demand could easily be ratcheted down to bring ending stocks to a comfortable level.

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