By Kirk Maltais


--Wheat for March delivery fell 2.8% to $7.95 a bushel on the Chicago Board of Trade Wednesday, with traders taking advantage of a slowdown in news out of the Russia-Ukraine border to take profits.

--Corn for March delivery rose 1.1% to $6.27 a bushel.

--Soybeans for March delivery rose 2.3% to $14.40 a bushel.


HIGHLIGHTS


Locking in Profits: Wheat futures fell today, with traders electing to engage some profit-taking as news out of the Russia-Ukraine border has temporarily stagnated. "NATO and Russia appear to be locked into a stalemate with threatening economic sanction barbs being bantered between the U.S./Europe and Russia," said AgResource. Traders also waited for the Federal Reserve to announce its intention for future rate hikes, and will likely trade on today's press conference tomorrow.

Lingering Risk: While corn and wheat futures fell amid profit-taking and a standstill in news out of the Russia-Ukraine border, soybeans rose - with traders thinking that production risks remain in South American growing areas, even with recent rainfall. "The market is choosing to ignore soft demand dynamics in China to focus on what it perceives to be lingering production risks in the weeks ahead in South America, coupled with the emerging renewable diesel industry that will significantly ramp up demand for soyoil in the months and years ahead," said Arlan Suderman of StoneX. Scattered rainfall is expected in Brazil and Argentina through the weekend, according to DTN.


INSIGHTS


Optimistic Forecast: Grain traders surveyed by The Wall Street Journal this week are forecasting that export sales of soybeans, soymeal, and soyoil are all expected to be higher for the week ended January 20. Traders surveyed are expecting soybean sales to total anywhere from 700,000 metric tons to 2.2 million tons, while soymeal is expected between 100,000 tons to 600,000 tons and soyoil is expected to total 10,000 tons to 40,000 tons. The high end of all three of the forecasts are higher than their totals reported last week, driven by flash sale announcements from the USDA in the past week.

Stacking Up: U.S. stocks of ethanol rose as expected this week, hitting their highest level since May 2020. In its latest weekly report, the EIA said that for the week ended January 21, U.S. ethanol inventories totaled 24.48 million barrels - up from 23.59 million barrels last week. It's the most since May 2020, when inventories were assessed at 25.61 million barrels. Analysts surveyed this week by Dow Jones had forecast inventories to land anywhere between 23.7 million barrels and 24.49 million barrels. Daily production, meanwhile, fell for the week - dropping to 1.04 million barrels per day. Analysts had forecast production to be anywhere from 1.01 million barrels to 1.09 million barrels.


AHEAD


--The USDA will release its weekly export sales report at 8:30 a.m. ET Thursday.

-Mondelez International Inc. will release its fourth-quarter earnings report after the stock market closes on Thursday.

--The CFTC will release its weekly commitment of traders report at 3:30 p.m. ET Friday.


Write to Kirk Maltais at kirk.maltais@wsj.com


(END) Dow Jones Newswires

01-26-22 1453ET