WASDE data out at 11:00 a.m. this morning.

Overnight soybean trade was mostly higher, while corn was steady, but as morning hours arrived, prices softened. Recent strength is finding profit-taking and renewed selling after this week’s gains ahead of today’s WASDE crop report out at 11:00 a.m. CT. The South American crop sizes will be the focal point of today’s data, with the Brazilian corn and soybean crop sizes scrutinized.

The US dollar has declined to its lowest level since late January as the sharp increase in US debt and Washington's limited push to cut spending ahead of this fall’s elections is becoming obvious. Gold, silver, and bitcoin continue to advance as investors see this as a visible punishing hedge against Washington’s failed budgets.

Pres. Biden's State of the Union address overnight lacked any progress in passing the 2024 Farm Bill. He did call food companies for using shrink-flation rather than acknowledging the shrinkage of the buying power of the US dollar. This morning’s jobs number came in at 275K for February, beating the forecast of 200K and higher than the downwardly revised 229K for January. The US dollar weakened this morning, strengthening metals as the January report was revised down sharply from 353K to 229K. The employment rate subsequently moved by .02 percentage points to 3.9% in February, which has now reached its highest level since January 2022 and was above market expectations of 3.7%. The dollar is down $0.42 as of this writing at 7:41 AM, with the June contract trading at 102.00.

The trade is waiting for confirmation of more rumors that China will be canceling another 2-3 SRW wheat cargoes on top of yesterday’s 130,000 MT cancellation. Also, Egypt canceled its wheat tender due to the higher-than-expected price offers from Russia. According to Karen Braun with Reuters, US corn exports to Mexico have reached 17.3 MMT at the halfway point of 23/24, more than ever shipped to Mexico in an entire marketing year.

A Brazilian data service company noted that Brazilian farmer bankruptcy rose 535% to 127 filings in 2023. Most were soy growers, along with some cattle ranchers and coffee growers. The driving factors were climate issues and higher interest rates.

The common theme of below-normal rains across Northern and Central Brazil continues with heat across Paraguay into N Brazil with widespread 90s. Near to above-normal rain for Argentina favors late-filling corn/soybeans with highs in the 80s/90s. Weather models continue to produce the same weather pattern precipitation outlay in Brazil's 11-15 day model. Soil moisture levels are in decline, which will be important for Brazil’s second corn crop in April/May as the monsoon appears to be retreating. The winter corn crop is 73% of all the corn grown in Brazil.

Cattle and feeder cattle markets pushed higher late Thursday, with a firm outlook for early trade today. Fund buying picked up yesterday across a host of commodities, and financial markets have spilled over into the cattle trade. Cash trade on Thursday did start with live sales, which were quoted in the north as $2-4 higher for the week and $185-187. The dressed trade was $2 higher at $1 292. Meanwhile, live sales in Kansas were quoted at $186, which was $3 higher for the week and at a new record high. Box beef values jumped on Thursday, with Choice picking up $17 and Select higher by $17. Both values have now reached new weekly highs, and Select is now at its highest price since last June. All cattle contracts yesterday beyond April marked their highest closes since early October. Fridays typically trade higher, and it appears that the live cattle array will push through multi-week congestion on the top side.