European market

Due to weather improvement, harvest works have resumed in the North of France during the weekend. FranceAgrimer was estimating soft wheat harvest done at 85% on last Monday and spring barley at 80%.

The euro is on the front of the stage to start the week with a further rise at 1.1735 vs dollar. Crude oil is also progressing, close to 50 $/barrel in NY.

On Euronext, 32 481 lots of wheat have been exchanged on Friday and 55 lots traded on the CME. The spread of prices between the two contracts is of about 2 €/t, due to Hagberg differential of quality, 220 minimum is required on Euronext vs 170 minimum on the CME.

The rapeseed continues to benefit from very dry conditions in the south of Canada, main producer. The strength of crude oil also linked to geopolitical troubles in Venezuela is another factor of support.

American market

Quiet market in Chicago on Friday with wheat and corn prices finishing nearly unchanged. Only soybean was showing steadiness boosted by crude oil.

Weather conditions are still at the center of concerns with small rains on the Corn Belt during the weekend, pushing traders to some sell off in pre-opening.

Funds were net buyers of 3 000 lots of wheat, 5 000 lots of soybean and 3 000 lots of corn.

The weakness of the dollar brought some support elements. Prices are not paying enough for wheat and corn producers.

Black Sea market

Russia and Ukraine have considerably increased the pace of shipments of the new harvest. These two countries managed to load respectively nearly 500 000 t of cereals on a weekly basis. First, Russia shipped 320 000 t of wheat, 195 000 t of barley and 90 000 t of corn during last week.

Ukraine in the same time loaded 289 000 t of wheat, 144 000 t of barley and only 26 000 t of corn as availabilities are now running out.