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USDA released their May WASDE report.  It provides us with their first balance sheets on the 2017 crops using the March Prospective Planting acreage for corn and soybeans.

Updates to 2016 crop usage lowered both corn and soybean ending stocks. Old crop corn usage increased net 25 million bushels reducing ending stocks to 2.295 billion bushels.  Old crop soybean usage increased net 10 million bushels reducing ending stocks to 435 million bushels.

For the corn crop being planted now, USDA used a 170.7 bushel yield which resulted in production of 14.065 billion bushels. That is almost 1.1 billion bushels less than the 2016 crop.  With usage of 14.3 billion bushels, ending stocks were projected at 2.110 billion bushels which was less than trade estimates.

For the 2017 soybean crop, they plugged in a yield of 48.0 bushels per acre which resulted in production of 4.255 billion bushels.  They are also projecting record usage of 4.235 billion bushels resulting in ending stocks of 480 million bushels which is approximately 100 million bushels below the average of trade estimates.

USDA also estimated world ending stocks for the next crop year.  World corn ending stocks for the 2017/18 crop year are projected to decline to 195.3 MMT (due largely to fewer US corn acres) and world soybean ending stocks are projected to decline to 88.8 MMT.  The world’s appetite continues to grow.

View the entire WASDE report here

Graphic courtesy of Advance Trading Inc