Big Day for Corn and Soybeans Friday

Friday we will likely have some excitement in the grain markets. At 7:30 am the USDA will release about 5 or 6 weeks of export sales that were delayed because of the partial Federal Government shutdown. There was a lot of talk about China buying beans during the shutdown, even with the trade war. So, we should see some very big export sales. However, were all the export sales reported to the USDA during the shutdown?

There is a law that if export sales are over a certain amount it must be reported to the USDA. The USDA then releases the information the next morning as a daily export sales announcement. Did exporters report any large export sale to the USDA during the shutdown? Did the USDA get the information processed when the USDA opened after the shutdown?

We could get some bullish numbers or bearish compared to expectations tomorrow morning. I do like the idea of the export sales report being released at 7:30 when the markets are closed. That gives traders an hour to analyze the report before the grain markets reopen at 8:30. Remember too that Friday we will see the numbers from the USDA Outlook Forum.

The USDA has had a history of the Outlook Forum coming up with some bearish assumptions. Gordy emailed me the acre projections that he saw today. Corn acres are projected at 92 million compared to 89.1 million in 2018. U.S. bean acres are projected at 85 million compared to 89.2 million in 2018. We are supposed to get the rest of the Outlook Forum Friday. Get ready, we are likely to see the corn and soybean markets move one way or the other Friday!