USDA produces the November supply and demand numbers Friday morning and traders positioning for the report rode out the day Thursday, leading to light volume. The trade expects a mostly neutral report, but Senior Market Analyst Arlan Suderman at Waterstreet Solutions says curve balls coming from USDA are certainly possible again.
“There are a lot of theories about that,” he told HAT. “There are two different divisions within USDA to put together reports. USDA NASS is a purely statistical analysis and I’ve gotten to know the people there and they really try to do a statistically accurate job of surveying and predicting size of crops. Sometimes I think they’re maybe out of touch with the country and some of the things that affect their numbers.”
Additionally USDA’s WASDE puts together the supply and demand numbers and they add another element to their report.
“They’re allowed to use what’s called judgment and so they use their judgment to alter numbers from time to time to what they think will happen, and I question those a lot more. And sometimes I think it’s just the difference of looking at from Washington vs. looking at it from Indianapolis or Lafayette.”
Suderman feels future conditions and reports should be positive for the corn and soybean markets.
“I really look at the strength in the corn market from the futures standpoint to probably be in the January to March area, and I think we’ll get a friendly harvested acre adjustment in January as well as the stocks report. Then we’ll start looking at the dry sub soils in the central and western Midwest and start worrying about 2013. Soybeans I think we’ll see our strength prior to that. Once we get past this supply and demand report and maybe focus a little bit more on demand and get a strong crush report next week, I think that will start supporting soybeans.”
He says wheat supports corn and the tighter and tighter world wheat supplies bode well for both of those markets.[audio:https://www.hoosieragtoday.com//wp-content/uploads//2012/11/Suderman-on-crop-report.mp3|titles=Suderman on crop report]