Back in 1992, when the trees were large, and most of the gurus of the Ukrainian agricultural market had not yet been born, the container ship Ever Laurel, owned by the Evergreen company, was sailing from Hong Kong to Tahoma. The ship was caught in a storm, and rubber toys fell out of the damaged container into the water, according to a legend that circulates on the Internet. So scientists were able to learn more about the movement of currents in the oceans - famous ducklings were found for many years on the coasts of different countries.

Evergreen can take on the motto - "We've been creating memes for you since 1992". If it doesn't go broke. Well, or it can enter into collaboration with the USDA, which has also become frequent with attempts to either surprise or make the world community laugh. Since the publication of yesterday's report on the structure of acreage in the United States, the groaning season about how much was sown, at what speed and whether moisture was caught, can officially be considered open.

The American ministry is prolific, but some of their reports have a tendency to strongly influence the nerves of robots on the stock exchange. A couple of weeks ago, the market began collecting rates on the structure of acreage: what do American farmers believe in more? The ratio of soybeans to corn, reaching 2.6p, suggests that either soybeans are undervalued or corn is overvalued, and historically pushes the farmer towards soybeans. Since the February presentation of the Agriculture Outlook Forum, where it was announced that the areas under wheat will reach 45 million acres, under corn - 92 million acres, and under soybeans - 90 million acres, prices have changed slightly, and market expectations have focused around 92.8 million. acres of corn, 90.3 million acres of soybeans, while Americans traditionally were less interested in wheat. Note that in the current season, corn planted areas were 90.8 million acres, and harvested areas - 82.5 million acres. Soybeans were planted on 83.1 million acres, removed from 82.3 million acres. That is, the theory about the price ratio for the last contracts in a calendar year still works - the market saw a more rapid increase in the area under soybeans compared to last year than under corn.

The physical market has been sluggish in recent days - there was no demand, there was nothing special to feed the bulls. China, after an exchange of barbs with the Americans in Alaska, is sitting in ambush and counting dead pigs, Argentina is picking up corn and little by little striking, Brazil has come to its senses and is catching up with the pace of field work. The Black Sea region is crying in three streams - the Russians themselves cannot figure out how to calculate the amount of the new duty, and corn is expensive in Ukraine, as if the farmers know something.

In general, everything would be fine: wheat itself would continue to fall in price on expectations of a good harvest, corn would be forced to go down, the seed would still be at the price of black caviar. If not for the USDA.

During this evening we went through all the stages of accepting the inevitable. From denial - “Come on, are you kidding? A total of 91.1 million acres of corn, 87.6 million acres of soybeans and as much as 46 million acres of wheat ?! ”, through anger -“ are they out there? ”, Bargaining -“ maybe this is a mistake? Have you missed something? Somewhere we have lost another 2-3 million acres ”, depression -“ buy by hearsay ”and until the next report we will live in acceptance. Oh yes! The last straw in this psychedele was the neighboring report on stocks: there is much more wheat than expected, soybeans - just more, and only corn - less. In fact, the American account itself should have shattered the hopes of those who did not sell wheat. But on the stock exchange it was carried up on the corn wave.

Evergreen container ship Ever Given stranded in the Suez Canal. Photo source: apnews.com

Those who registered before the report and got out of contracts a little, in order to play it safe, ran back and jerked the brake crane along the road. Well, what was there to do if corn could no longer be bought? That's right, buy wheat. At the same time, let me remind you that we have not yet observed demand in the physical market. Corn can now, apart from the hope that China will come, be supported by the fact that Argentina is trading a premium to Chicago, and on the "grown Chicago" we may not look so expensive. But only if their premium is not crushed by a shaft of new corn mixed with last year's leftovers.

On wheat, the sadness from so far optimistic harvest expectations is added by the Russian duty, which floats wherever it wants, but in accordance with the general line of the government. The average will be calculated daily on the basis of Fob prices for contracts of a maximum of 60 days ago and a minimum of 4 days with shipment up to 60 days in advance. Weekly this average will be averaged, 200 is subtracted from it, and 70% of this is the size of the duty for the next week.

In general, no one really understands this set of words, not only you. Now, when you take a position, you have two unknowns in the Russian equation - the price at which you can buy off this contract, and the duty, which depends on the entire bazaar. By clockwork, from September 1, they will simply be from Reuters' indicative, which, in fact, are the same embryos of chickens, only in profile. All this gimmick will fall on the farmer, and the price will supposedly fall on the domestic market. Good idea, of course. God forbid we repeat it.

The oilseed complex this season looks, in general, no less intriguing. And if there is an excuse for the seed - there is objectively little of it in Ukraine, then the import of soybeans, or rapeseed, is rather an attempt to show farmers that greed is bad. But thank God, the seeds are still not as critically small as in Romania, which is already buying a third boat in Argentina, although they are in trouble with oil and weeds. Here, Bulgaria has finally started selling meal to China.

In general, we are once again faced with the fact that everything is completely incomprehensible, but very interesting. The main thing is to learn how to read and understand the news. Because what looks like a duck, swims like a duck, quacks like a duck, is probably a duck. Only not all news that does not correspond to our perception of the world are ducks. Whether it is Ukraine's wheat or soybean imports, the lost American acreage or the appetites of Chinese pigs.

Source