Thursday March 26, 2020

• U.S. dollar tanking – conversely our Canadian dollar has but on more than a penny gains since yesterday 
  • Over 3 million claims for un-employment in the U.S. – highest number by far ever 
• U.S. COVID 19 cases looking at weeks of exponential growth – Trump ignoring expert advise and talking about lifting social restrictions 
  • May be good for shareholders – but not so good for citizens 
• USDA report out on Tuesday March 31
  • overall expecting quarterly stocks to be tighter than a year ago levels 
  • Acreage projections still have average corn planted above 94 million and beans below 85 million
    • These have been the projections since January of this year – though the last three weeks the ethanol industry has hit tough times there may be a sway in these numbers before seed hits the ground although likely will not impact the USDA’s estimate for next weeks report 
    • Full estimates below 
• Another strong export week from the U.S. last week, all commodities sales over expected ranges and with all three having sales to China
  • As for progress toward meeting USDA targets, wheat is right on needed sales pace, corn is starting to narrow the gap between sales and pace needed, beans however still have a large deficit in what has been sold to what they need to sell to meet USDA target 
• Argentina’s actions to attempt to slow the spread of coronavirus includes the slowing of grains to its export hubs – farmers are starting to hang on to beans and corn as prices drop to below year ago levels 

USDA Quarterly Stocks (in billion bushels)
	USDA March 1, 2020	Avg. Estimate	Range	USDA March 1, 2019	USDA Dec 1, 2019
Corn		8.125	7.825-8.492	8.613	11.389
Soybeans		2.241	2.075-2.701	2.727	3.252
Wheat		1.432	1.385-1.572	1.593	1.834

USDA Prospective Plantings (in million acres)
	March USDA	Avg. Estimate	Range	USDA Ag Forum	USDA 2019 Final
Corn		94.328	92.5-96.4	94.0	89.7
Soybeans		84.465	82.7-87.1	85.0	76.1
All Wheat		44.982	44.4-46.0	45.0	45.2
Winter Wheat		30.900	30.2-31.7	30.8	31.2