CHICAGO, May 24 (Xinhua) -- Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT) agricultural futures closed mixed on Wednesday, with corn and soybean rising and wheat falling.
The most active corn contract for July delivery rose 9.75 cents, or 1.69 percent, to settle at 5.8725 U.S. dollars per bushel. July wheat fell 16 cents, or 2.57 percent, to settle at 6.0625 dollars per bushel. July soybean gained 2 cents, or 0.15 percent, to settle at 13.245 dollars per bushel.
Wheat futures sagged in response to weaker EU and Russian price offers. Old wheat crop abundance amid the potential curtailed new crop is not allowing a sustainable wheat price trend.
A long U.S. holiday weekend, U.S. debt ceiling impasse, and worrisome Central U.S. weather are all at play at the CBOT. Central U.S. dryness continues to command more attention with each passing dry day. Chicago-based research company AgResource holds that it is too early to be overly concerned by Midwest dryness in May. If the dryness is forecast to extend to next week, that is when the bull market begins.
The Energy Information Administration (EIA) indicated that 883,000 barrels of ethanol were produced last week, which consumed 289 million bushels of corn. U.S. ethanol stocks fell a sharp 49 million gallons to 925 million gallons, the lowest May ethanol stocks total in years. And U.S. gasoline consumption was up 7 percent from last year at 9.44 million barrels a day, a record large. U.S. gasoline stocks are at a three-year low of 216 million barrels heading into one of the busiest summer driving weekend of the year.
It will be wetter for Iowa, Minnesota and Missouri as a storm system pushes farther east late next week. Otherwise, the Midwest holds an arid weather pattern for the next 10 days. The Canadian Prairies will see widely scattered showers over the next 10 days.
