- Ed Usset, University of Minnesota
- Mark Russo, EverStream.ai
From the land to grant university in Urbana Champaign, Illinois. This is the closing market reported as the October 2025. I'm extension's Todd Gleason. Coming up, we'll talk about the commodity markets with Kurt Kimmel. He's at agmarket.net.
Todd Gleason: 00:14We'll hear from Ed As, an agricultural economist at the University of Minnesota. He's really concerned about the basis levels backing up from the soybean prices in North Dakota. And then we'll turn our attention to the weather forecast with Mark Russo. He's at Everstream Analytics. All on this Monday edition of the closing market report that comes to you from Illinois Public Media.
Todd Gleason: 00:37It is public radio for the farming world online on demand anytime you'd like it. Willag.org, willag.0rg. And don't forget there's a donate button there if you are so inclined. Make a contribution and make sure that you put in the comments section in support of agriculture. Todd Gleason services are made available to WILL by University of Illinois Extension.
Todd Gleason: 01:05December corn for the day settled at $4.21 and 3 quarters, up 2 and 3 quarters of a cent. The March at $4.38 and a quarter, two and a half higher. And the May contract at $4.47 at a quarter, up 2¢. November beans, a quarter lower. They finished at $10.17 and 3 quarters.
Todd Gleason: 01:22January, October and three quarters down a penny and a quarter. And the March contract at $10.51, down 1 and a quarter cents. Bean meal futures, a buck 50 lower. The bean oil, 33¢ higher. Wheat futures for the soft red, down two and a half.
Todd Gleason: 01:36They're at $5.12 and 3 quarters on the settlement price. That the December contract December hard red down a penny and a half at $4.95 and a half. Live cattle futures, $2.17 and a half higher. Feeder cattle, up $5.37 and a half cents, and lean hogs, off just 2 and a half cents for the day. Crude oil, on the day, trading at $61.63 a barrel, about 75¢ higher, and the wholesale price of gasoline now at a buck 90, up three and nine tenths of a cent.
Todd Gleason: 02:08Here to talk about all these numbers and what they mean to the marketplace is Kurt Kimmel. He's at agmarket.net. Hello, Kurt. Thanks for being with us. I bet you have numbers on the weekly crop progress report for us today.
Todd Gleason: 02:21Oh, wait a second. No. You don't. No. You do not.
Todd Gleason: 02:23That's the way we That's the way it goes.
Curt Kimmel: 02:26Got an idea.
Todd Gleason: 02:27What do you think they look like? What's the trade thinking?
Curt Kimmel: 02:30Well, wherever the trades at, we're a little further along. I think particularly in beans as a nation, the estimates are from the analysts are coming anywhere from 35 upwards towards 48% complete as a nation. On beans corn, 29 to 33% complete as a nation. I think it's, you know, a little further along than that, particularly on beans, you're gonna have to look pretty hard for beans. Guys have been fairly aggressive on beans in through here, so those are being wrapped up, if not wrapped up, corn.
Curt Kimmel: 03:07A couple elevator reports, starting to see more corn come in now, here today versus, last week, so it dry, dry, dry. Some producers have stopped, in in some areas. It's the fact that the risk of, fires and so forth. It's amazing that, the fires we've seen this fall time.
Todd Gleason: 03:29Yeah. So we've had fires and be careful out there if you're in the field. Also, if you're on the back roads, be careful because there's a lot of slow moving machinery out there. Have you had producers call you about soybeans that are going across the scale? I know at the elevator, they're asking sometimes what they should do with them.
Todd Gleason: 03:49Have you had those calls, or and do you have advice for them?
Curt Kimmel: 03:54Yeah, we've been seeing actually normal sales across the scale. The commercial was hoping for mass sales across the scales. We've actually seen basis firm up in some areas. I think the commercial side, the buyer side of the equation is wanting to buy stuff much cheaper from here, but it's just not happening. I think producers are stocking it, way in storage, finding a home for it.
Curt Kimmel: 04:20Beets have taken corn storage here, particularly on some temporary storage, so on the wide basis they've decided to, store it one way or another. If you do, move some green here this fall, you know, beans which we're visiting about right now, I'd look at some type of replacement strategy. We've been doing some call, call spreads to keep your foot in the door. Reason being, if we would, see something develop here on US and China, but more importantly is, is that we feel the Southern Hemisphere is fairly well sold out, So if it would run into a weather situation here this winter during their growing season, we'd be in a position to, see some additional demand, come our way. Are we going $13.14 dollars?
Curt Kimmel: 05:12No. But we feel we could, you know, something going to the upside here as we go into this South American, growing season. We just will be flexible and and have an opportunity to add to our bottom line, Todd.
Todd Gleason: 05:26I think it was a conversation that I had with you maybe last week about farmers using bags, and finding ways, to store more corn on the farm than they have and had in the past. Do you still think that's the case? And is there advice for that those extra bushels that are now on the ground?
Curt Kimmel: 05:45Yeah. We we've seen a little bit more com comfort bags and storing on the ground. The crop's incredibly dry. It's been kind of a little bit of a chuckle. The propane guys are gonna have a tough winter unless it's real cold because of the lack of, you know, having to drive the crop down as we see, have seen in the past and through here.
Curt Kimmel: 06:10But yeah, guys have been creative, bagging it, temporarily stacking it some places. There, I wish I could remember there was an area where lumber, you can't buy any lumber because they were building some temporary coverage, for, for some, grain needed a a home in through here. So producers and elevators and you know, they've been kind of creative in here trying to find a home for this stuff here as we start to enter all the last third of the bean harvest and the last half or maybe two thirds of corn harvest.
Todd Gleason: 06:49As you move through the month of October, what will you be watching? This is the crop insurance setting month again.
Curt Kimmel: 06:57Yeah, we'll see how that unfolds in through here. It kind of feels like these corns dialed into this $4.15 $4.3 trading range. You know, the November beans are kind of dialed in from $10 to $10.35 it's range bound. With the government information zero, I think it's gonna be awful hard for the market to, push sharply one way or the other. I think most of the action is gonna be in the basis and I think you gotta watch cash bids, if they start to firm in through here, that's gonna be your first sign that demand's a little bit better than what they've been letting on.
Todd Gleason: 07:37Anything in the livestock sector before I let you go? Just short stuff.
Curt Kimmel: 07:41Oh, know, cattle defying the law of gravity. We've kind of moved to above some resistance here, so they're off to the moon, once again in through here. And the other thing I think we've got to kind of, keep watch is on is the outside markets. This metal market's just on fire. You know, if we're gonna have some inflations, hopefully, one of these days, they'll spill over to the grain market.
Todd Gleason: 08:08Hey. Thank you much.
Curt Kimmel: 08:09You bet, Todd. Take care.
Todd Gleason: 08:11That's Kurt Kimmel. He is with agmarket.net. In today's agricultural news, California's adoption of e 15 is a bright spot amid the struggling farm economy and the government shutdown. California governor Newsom signing his legislation's e 15 bill made the state the last remaining and biggest to allow sales of the higher ethanol blends, Renewable Fuels Association's Troy Bradenkamp never doubted Newsom would sign the unanimously passed bill.
Troy Bradenkamp: 08:45He got on board last year. RFA commissioned a study, with UC Berkeley and others that looked at what would E15 mean to the California consumer.
Todd Gleason: 08:56Bradencamp says the study's findings were significant.
Troy Bradenkamp: 08:59That study showed a a $2,700,000,000 per year savings to California consumers, almost $200 per household.
Todd Gleason: 09:06Those numbers helped fuel Newsome's signature on the bill.
Troy Bradenkamp: 09:09As soon as we were able to get that report in front of him, he has been on board with getting e 15 jump started in California.
Todd Gleason: 09:17Breidencamp says California will add almost 600,000,000 gallons of new demand for American ethanol or some 200,000,000 bushels of corn. He says he hopes California's move will give added momentum to year round e 15 legislation in congress. Now let's move from California to Washington DC where president Trump is considering a massive aid program for US farmers according to multiple outlets, floating the potentially tariff funded idea as agriculture industry navigates low commodity prices and high operating cost amidst Trump's trade wars. The aid package could provide some $10,000,000,000 or more for US farmers according to the Wall Street Journal, which cited unnamed people familiar with the discussions who said money could start being distributed in the coming months. Trump officials are evaluating how money made from tariffs could supplement farmer payments.
Todd Gleason: 10:14And that's a look at today's agricultural news. Ed Acid, agricultural economist at the University of Minnesota with Extension now joins us to talk about the marketplace. Ed, usually, about this time, we'd be discussing the October crop production and USDA reports, but I suppose that's not happening this week. So we should move on to other topics, which include something USDA has dabbled with, but I don't know they've ever put a zero in the exports to China for soybeans. What do you think the trade's planning for the month of October here without direction from USDA?
Ed Usset: 11:13Well, I I I think the trade will get by okay for one month without a WASDE report. I I guess I have this question from a former grad student of mine. The world won't fall apart. I think we've got a lot of private, analysts who keep tabs on things. Of course, there's a chance for a surprise when they finally come out.
Ed Usset: 11:35We get the USDA's view of things, but I I think we'll be okay for one month.
Todd Gleason: 11:40We're okay for one month, but are we okay is the really the the bottom line question.
Ed Usset: 11:46Oh, no. Oh, we've got issues. We've got issues. We've got trade issues. I'm up here in the, upper you know, the northern part of the, Corn Belt.
Ed Usset: 11:59And just west of me are the Dakotas. And the Dakotas absolutely in the world of soybean production. And keep in mind, North Dakota is number four state on soybean acres. I mean, that kind of surprises people. You've got Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, the obvious three, but North Dakota is number four on soybean acres.
Ed Usset: 12:25And North Dakota producers depend on sending those soybeans by shuttle train to the West Coast for export to Asia and China in particular. You've shut that off, and it's creating big, big problems in the Dakotas. The soybean harvest has begun. Gotta find a place to put it, and it's hard to do if it's not moving.
Todd Gleason: 12:53Really hard to do if it's not moving. That means the basis should be back in up into your area in not a good way, I suppose.
Ed Usset: 13:01Yes. Yes. You've got basis levels in the Dakotas, a 150 to a 170 under the November contract. That's gotta be a minimum of 50¢ worse than you might expect in a normal year if we have those things anymore. Here in Minnesota, I notice in Southwestern Minnesota, we're at about 90 under.
Ed Usset: 13:24Even the soybean crush plants, are at 50 under, which is pretty wide for that time. So it is backing up, and, it's a big problem. It's a big problem.
Todd Gleason: 13:39Are you hearing about storage problems and large in charges, those kinds of things?
Ed Usset: 13:45Yes. They're trying to figure it out. I don't I I think one good thing going on is the corn export pace is very good. And I think a lot of producers, have this opportunity to, if they have storage, focus on storing soybeans and move the corn at harvest because, you know, the basis is not so terrible as soybeans. So you've got that alternative in front of you.
Ed Usset: 14:17There's a lot of, bagging of soybeans going on in the Dakotas. And we'll see how we we're gonna hear a lot more about it in the next week or two, how it's going.
Todd Gleason: 14:32As the market stands, what are your biggest concerns going forward related to direction?
Ed Usset: 14:37Well, this this trade issue is gonna hang over our head like a rain cloud. You know, it's not easily fixed. We cannot build new markets fast enough to replace that. You gotta keep in mind. I'll tell you what you know and all your listeners know that over the last ten years, China basically accounts for 25 of our soybean demand year after year.
Ed Usset: 15:04Take away twenty eighteen, nineteen when we had the initial trade war. We're not gonna replace 25% of our demand easily, quickly. It's nice to see the, renewable diesel continue to grow, crushing capacity continue to grow, but it's not growing 25%. And, alter other countries we could sell to, I don't even know if they have the crushing capacity to take more. We will get more business from other countries simply because, other countries might get crowded out of the Brazil and Argentina markets.
Ed Usset: 15:49They can only have so much export capacity. So we might end up getting a few players coming our way who got crowded out of Brazil.
Todd Gleason: 15:58How does this all back into the corn market, which, as you mentioned, has had really good exports, and USDA has said exports for next year, feed residual usage, for next year or current year should be really good as well. Yeah.
Ed Usset: 16:15Record. Yeah. Record. We've got big carries in all three markets. That tells me that we we've got plenty of ample stocks, not only in soybeans, but in corn and in wheat.
Ed Usset: 16:27Thankfully, the demand side of the corn market is continuing apace. Again, I think, given the situation, I would lean if I had the choice, if I have the capacity, move the corn before the soybeans. And hope we hope we figure something out on the trade side because there's a lot of upside if we do in the soybean basis.
Todd Gleason: 16:56Soybeans are an anchor on the market at the moment. How much do you suppose they are an anchor on corn in dollars and cents?
Ed Usset: 17:07It it it I I don't I can't put a number on it. I'm just not smart enough, Todd, to put a number on that. I know this will become a bigger issue when we turn to the new year and we start talking about planting intentions in 02/1926. That's where it becomes a real anchor because if we don't improve, the, the price and the basis in the world of soybeans, we're gonna get even more corn acres next year. And that'll be an anchor.
Todd Gleason: 17:41No. That could be really ugly. Really. Yes. It Really fast.
Ed Usset: 17:45Yes. It could.
Todd Gleason: 17:45Really ugly. Because we already have large usage built into this number that's over 2,000,000,000 for the carryout by the time we get to the fall of next year, could change things dramatically. Farmers will have to think about it. Do they need to think about marketing any of next year's corn, soybeans, or wheat crop?
Ed Usset: 18:04You certainly could. I don't think that the if you look at the new crop futures contracts, the DIS '26 corn contract, the November 26 soybean contract, Neither one of them points to a profitable level, but there are big carriers in the market. So they are at a premium to today's numbers. I'm gonna take a quick look at corn up at the December 26 contract maybe close to $4.60. I'm just not gonna hate to do this.
Ed Usset: 18:39Yeah. It's right at $4.60. Boy, it wouldn't be the worst thing in the world to get something, on the books for next year.
Todd Gleason: 18:48Hey. Thanks much. We'll talk with you again in a month.
Ed Usset: 18:51Okay. Thank you, Todd.
Todd Gleason: 18:53That's Ed Asit, agricultural economist from the University of Minnesota. You may hear more from Ed on our website. Look for the closing market report. You can find that as a podcast too. Search it out by name in your favorite podcast applications.
Todd Gleason: 19:07Of course, the website address is willag.org, willag.0rg. And there you'll find the list of our winter meetings. You'll have to look in December about the twelfth. The Farm Assets Conference is then. We've not opened registration up yet, but that will happen soon.
Todd Gleason: 19:26We had a meeting, in fact, with the PharmDoc team today about both the Farm Assets Conference, which will be the twelfth, and then the following Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, the Illinois Farm Economic Summits. Put those in the back of your mind. We'll have information up on the websites soon enough for the Farm Assets Conference and the Illinois Farm Economic Summits. Let's check out the global growing regions and the weather forecast for each of them or some of them with Mark Russo. He's at Everest Dream Analytics.
Todd Gleason: 20:07Hi, Mark. Thanks so much for being with us. It has been magnificent weather if you want to mark in the field, though dry conditions can cause some problems, particularly with wind and, field fires. I'm wondering if we're actually going to get a little rain and what the Corn Belt will look like over the next five to seven days.
Mark Russo: 20:28Well, Todd, yeah, there are some rainfall chances here in not only across Illinois, but the Midwest in general, and that's going to be taking place here later today on into tomorrow as a frontal system passes across the Midwest. And then looking out about a week from there's also another frontal passage that looks to provide some rain opportunity. So there's a little bit more opportunities in the pattern here compared to what it has been. By no means is this any transition to a wetter than normal pattern or anything that would, you know, be markedly different, at least from a rainfall standpoint here coming up. The one thing that is gonna be the same still is this warmer temperature bias, you know, as we've seen here lately, that that looks to continue for much of the next two weeks.
Todd Gleason: 21:16Will it be as warm as the warmer temperatures, or are we gonna cool off some?
Mark Russo: 21:21Yeah. There's gonna be some variability. Actually, following these frontal passages, temperatures become a little more, well, fluctuate a little bit more here coming up. And at least some of the recent very impressive temperatures, you know, record setting temperatures in parts of the Midwest, that is going to be easing here going forward. But the the overall positive anomaly with temperatures, that still looks persistent here.
Mark Russo: 21:47It looks like all the way from now through the middle third of the month.
Todd Gleason: 21:51Yeah. So there's maybe a a lull or bottoming out of of of daytime temperatures over the next, I don't know, four or five, six days, and then back up in the eighties we go.
Mark Russo: 22:03Yeah. Certainly, it looks like that next warm up will be taking place on into late in the weekend and in the early part of next week.
Todd Gleason: 22:09What else you've been watching in The United States? Anything?
Mark Russo: 22:12Oh, we're watching favorable weather for winter wheat planting across the plains hard red winter wheat belt. Their soil moisture is in very, very good shape. It's a near perfect start growing season or planting season so far in the plains.
Todd Gleason: 22:27And then if you turn your attention to South America, what things are happening there?
Mark Russo: 22:31Well, right now across Center West and much of Eastern Brazil, they're actually in a heat wave, in generally suppressed rainfall. That doesn't look to last very long here as we get into the upcoming weekend and next week, rain activity looks to return to those areas, and that will help provide an increase improvement in soil moisture, which again very timely at this, stage of the early stage of the planting season.
Todd Gleason: 22:55Hey. Thank you so much. I appreciate
Mark Russo: 22:57it. You're welcome, Todd.
Todd Gleason: 22:58It's Mark Russo. He is with Everstream Analytics, joined us on this Monday edition of the closing market report that came to you from Illinois Public Media. I'm University of Illinois Extension's Todd Gleason.