North Gower Grains

Wednesday, February 4, 2026, 7:25 am

Tuesday was a mostly positive day for our markets.  Spot corn closed up 2 3/4, spot soybeans closed up 5 1/2, spot winter wheat closed up 1 and spot spring wheat closed down 3 1/4.  In the overnight trade all of our markets have fallen back on the negative side.  Oil closed up $1.07 yesterday at $63.21 per barrel.  It is stronger in trading again this morning with it now valued at $63.48 per barrel.  Our dollar started out yesterday morning at $0.731 US and then trended higher going up to $0.734 US in the overnight trading.  This morning it has pulled back some with it currently valued at $0.732 US.

An announcement was made yesterday in the US concerning some of their clean fuel regulations.  They did confirm that only domestic (plus Canada and Mexico) feed stocks will qualify for the subsidy being brought forward for production of biodiesel or ethanol.  They also brought forward a program that will reward farmers for producing corn and soybeans with a smaller carbon footprint.  This sounds somewhat similar to the ISCC (low carbon footprint) program that we participate in with our local ethanol plant.  All in all the new announcement was supportive for soybean oil and should also be supportive for the ethanol industry going forward.  One negative for the proposed increased usage of soybean oil for biodiesel was thoughts that the increased soybean crush will result in increased supplies of soybean meal and this market pulled back yesterday.

Wheat prices remained pressured globally with more reports out of India that they are looking at record production this year.  US wheat remains expensive on the world market with Russia continuing to keep prices low to insure that their wheat is in demand on the world market.  Prices have fallen for 3 consecutive trading days on the CBOT even with some thoughts of how much winter damage was made to the winter wheat crop in the US with the recent cold weather across much of their growing regions.  Strong world supply will continue to keep a lid on prices in the wheat market.

Ethanol production in Brazil is expected to increase about 8% this year.  This will include ethanol made by both sugar cane and corn.  Corn usage is expected to increase by 17% and this will result in them utilizing just over 20% of their corn production to produce ethanol.  Although this may result in Brazil exporting ethanol the increased usage of corn could result in less corn being available for export.  This of course is positive for corn going forward.