CommStock Reports

09/15/2025 U.S., China Relationship Complexities Muddy Talks On the Grains Corn, soybeans and wheat pulled back from Friday’s gains during overnight trade. After an upside breakout from the short-term consolidation range on Friday, December corn futures are holding above previous resistance so far this morning. November soybeans are in the middle of the range from the August high to the Sept. 4 low. Wheat futures remain anchored near their recent lows. While traders are still scratching their heads over USDA’s increases to corn and soybean harvested acres, market focus will be on U.S./China trade talks and the Fed’s expected midweek interest rate cut. Top trade negotiators from the U.S. and China are meeting for a second day in Madrid, Spain. Chinese officials are lobbying for a visit by President Donald Trump to China, seeing it as a major diplomatic win for President Xi Jinping. While TikTok’s U.S. future is the centerpiece of the Madrid talks, as it faces a Wednesday deadline to separate from parent company ByteDance, China’s agricultural purchases, especially soybeans, are also a focus. Trump has pressed Beijing to commit to a sharp increase in U.S. soybean imports. However, China has yet to act on the request, with officials signaling they will not make large-scale purchases without broader progress in the talks. The reluctance underscores Beijing’s strategy of offering as little as possible while seeking the symbolic prize of a Trump visit. In Washington, there is mounting pressure from Congress for Trump officials to press China on its overproduction. Democrats have asked the Trump ...

Light back-and-fill expected for the grains after a firmer Friday finish. Traders wait for word on how Chinese trade meetings are progressing while preparing for the Fed decision coming Wednesday. In the Headlines U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent was set to start trade meetings with top level Vice Premier from China. The talks will span Sunday to Wednesday in Spain. These plans were just announced by the Treasury Department last Thursday, coming as a surprise after Bessent had previously suggested that he was not likely to meet in person with Chinese negotiators until late October or early November. There will be additional tension after the U.S. government sanctioned more Chinese companies last week, before China opened new anti-dumping cases against U.S. semiconductor manufacturers this weekend. Focus is on the central bank meeting this week. The Fed will announce an expected interest rate cut on Wednesday at 1 pm central with a press conference following 30 minutes later. Traders look convinced that this first rate cut since late 2024 will be just one-quarter of a point, but the market has lately displayed small odds for a half-point reduction. House Republicans have started work on a stopgap bill to fund the government before the next shutdown deadline arrives on the last day of the month. Another continuing resolution would likely only extend funding out to right before Thanksgiving. There were also ongoing efforts between the House and Senate to complete bigger spending packages that would avert the need for stopgap measures, but the timing is thought ...

09/12/2025 Bearish Crop Report, Bullish Reaction PLEASE REFER TO THE BROKER COMMENTARY PAGE FOR UPDATES!! Coming into the report, it was easy to wonder if analysts were unrealistic with an average estimate for corn yield that was nearly 3 bushels per acre down from August. The yield cut would be historically large, but so was the August estimate compared to recent records and the trend. What we ended up with was a healthy 2.1 bpa cut to 186.7 bpa, but again with the bigger surprise coming from acreage. Harvested corn acres were pulled higher by 1.36 million to more than offset the yield loss so that total production was raised to a new record of 16.81 billion bushels. Raised usage from ethanol and exports helped lead to a 7 million bushel reduction for corn ending stocks, to 2.11 billion bushels. Notable corn yield cuts came from Illinois being down 2 to 219, Iowa dropping 3 to 219, and Minnesota down 3 to 199 bpa. No states had their corn acres lowered from August and the biggest increases came from Minnesota's harvested acres rising by 190,000, Illinois' by 200,000, and Nebraska's by 240,000. The corn acreage change looked to have been produced more by the large addition in FSA-reported acres than the USDA needing to correct any previous discrepancy with the August numbers. With the FSA filings not complete yet in August or September, it is expected that adjustments can still occur for the USDA NASS calculations; however, this year's increase in the FSA corn acres was historically ...

09/12/2025 What to Expect From USDA On the Grains Corn, soybeans and wheat held in tight trading ranges overnight ahead of USDA’s reports later this morning.USDA’s Crop Production and Supply & Demand (WASDE) reports will be released at 11:00 a.m. CT. USDA is widely expected to lower its corn and soybean yields from August, though history says a large reduction isn’t likely. For corn, USDA has lowered yield in September six times during the past 10 years and raised yield the other four times. For soybeans, USDA has cut the yield four times, raised yield five times and left it unchanged once over the past 10 years.As I addressed in my video Tuesday afternoon, the five-year average change in yield from August to September for corn was a 1.1-bu.-per-acre cut, while the 10-year average was a 0.5-bu. reduction. USDA’s largest corn yield reduction in September during that period was 3.3 bu. in 2020 (derecho year), though it also cut yield 2.9 bu. in 2022 and three years saw a 1.3-bu. decline. The biggest increase was 2.9 bu. in 2018, which is a year that had the same good/excellent rating as this year’s crop to start September. For soybeans, the five-year average is a 0.6-bu.-per-acre cut to yield in September, with the 10-year average being no change. The largest reduction was 1.4 bu. in both 2020 and 2022. The biggest increase in the September yield was 1.7 bu. in 2016. Given this historical data and my expectations, yields will be lowered this month, I would put ...