December 15, 2012

About four cargoes of corn totalling 238,000 tonnes, on a cost and freight basis, for arrival in April and May were bought by South Korea's largest animal feed manufacturer Nonghyup Feed Inc. on Wednesday (Dec 12).

East Asian buyers are snapping up cargoes of corn due to the latest decline in prices and the discount of up to US$20/tonne on a delivered basis over feed wheat.

Except for one 40,000-tonne cargo which is of US or South African origin, the rest will be shipped from South America.

In mid-November, South Korean buyers had bought feed corn for March arrival around US$337/tonne and for May arrival around US$323.50/tonne. The difference of almost US$14/tonne is due to an expected bumper harvest of South American corn by April.