March 9, 2010
Tuesday: China soy futures settle tad up; USDA report in focus
China's Soy futures traded on the Dalian Commodity Exchange settled a tad higher Tuesday, with traders staying on the sidelines ahead of the U.S. Department of Agriculture's report Wednesday.
The benchmark September 2010 Soy contract settled up RMB4, or 0.1%, at RMB3,840 a tonne.
The contract opened higher and consolidated up and down within a tight range of RMB29/tonne in both the positive and negative territories during the session.
USDA is scheduled to release its March supply and demand revisions Wednesday at 8:30 a.m. EST (1330 GMT), and U.S. Soy stocks are forecast to be revised lower to 194 million bushels from 210 million bushels, Commonwealth Bank cited average trade estimates in its report.
However, at 194 million bushels, U.S. Soy stocks in 2009-10 would still be up significantly from the tight 2008-09 ending stocks of 138 million bushels.
Meanwhile, the market expects U.S. Soy output in 2009 to be lowered slightly in the report mainly due to wet harvest weather, but estimates will remain at record high levels, it added.
Analysts said if the USDA estimates match or are slightly lower than expectations, profit taking would commence.
Trading volume of all Soy contracts rose to 229,248 lots from 221,448 lots Monday.
Open interest fell 4,406 lots to 367,184 lots Tuesday.
Corn, soyoil, soymeal and palm oil futures all settled slightly higher.
Following are Tuesday's settlement prices in yuan a tonne for benchmark contracts and volume for all contracts in lots (one lot is equivalent to 10 tonnes):
Product Contract Settlement Price Change Volume
Soy Sep 2010 3,840 Up 4 229,248
Corn Sep 2010 1,869 Up 4 31,610
Soymeal Sep 2010 2,792 Up 7 784,812
Palm Oil Sep 2010 7,054 Up 40 812,322
Soyoil Sep 2010 7,554 Up 22 607,268
