Sep 10 | Closing Market Report

0:00From the Land to Grand University Intervanish campaign, Illinois, this is the closing market report for the 10th day of September 2026. I'm the University of Illinois extensions, Todd Cleeson. Coming up, we'll talk about the commodity markets and the jump in trade today. In tomorrow's USDA report with Matt Bennett, he's at agmarket.net. We're here on site at the farm progress show in Decatur at an agronomy day hosted by the Illinois So Abinissosian, where John Jones, University of Illinois soil scientist, made some fertilizer recommendations. I'll have those for you for both corn and soybeans. And then we'll turn our attention to the weather forecast as we wrap up our time together. We'll talk with Mike Tanoret, Teastorm Weather here on this Thursday edition of the Closing Market Report from Illinois Public Media. December Corn and Chicago finished December Corn and Chicago finished six higher at 533 and 3.25, the Marched 549 and a quarter up a 6th sense. November beans, 1332 at a quarter, up 22 and a quarter January up 22 at 1347 and a quarter.

1:02Matt Bennett from agmarket.net now joins us to take a look at the marketplace. So what a trade it was today in Chicago is most of this driven by announcements of more purchases made by China this week. I mean, there's no doubt that that probably helped. I mean, there's no question. I mean, whenever we look at confirmed sales to China plus the unknowns that we feel pretty confident or China just based on, you know, shipment size, for instance, cargoes, you name it like today. For instance, we know pretty much they bought two cargoes. You know, based upon that, you're probably around 50% of that 25 million metric ton of purchases already, which, you know, they said they wanted to get to that before September 24th whenever they're supposed to supposedly meet. And I say supposedly, because we all know that, you know, that could get pushed back, but regardless, but there's no doubt they've made a concerted effort to see that happen. I think it'll be very interesting to see

2:06next week, you know, do we continue to see these big purchases? Because that would certainly be a great sign. I do think, Todd, that there's probably a lot of folks that, you know, maybe sold off some contracts that are thinking, well, maybe I want to be long for this report. There's no doubt that the funds every time we've kind of pulled back, particularly in this bean market. I tell you, it's just been really impressive to see the buying that showed up. So my personal opinion today was a great gift, you know, for those that are wanting to maybe have a little more coverage going into what is sure to be a very volatile report. Well, I do have some questions about that report. And what took place today, and as you said, maybe a great gift, is because USDA, because I believe that this was and has been viewed by USDA since last fall, as purchases that will be made a commitment from China, and has already been built into the

3:09supply and demand tables. So I wouldn't think that the exports would change very much tomorrow for new crop, but maybe I'm wrong. Do you have an opinion on this? No, I don't believe that they will. I mean, there are already a very tight stock situation. But the impressive thing, Todd, is that, if you look, for instance, at the WASD from August, you would take your carry out from 325 down to 320 for new crop. Now again, that's at a 52.7, and we know that can change tomorrow. But with that being the case, Todd, that was adding 5.7 million acres. I mean, that's just, that's an incredible thing that we're experiencing here is that clearly the demand overall has been nothing short of phenomenal whenever we're looking at this. When you look at the world balance sheet, you know, you're not building world stocks on soybeans. After Brazil had a 171, then a 186 national crop, biggest soybean producer in the world just posted two back-to-back record crops, and we're not building

4:09soybean stocks in the world. So I do think that a lot of the folks are saying, hey, you know what, we absolutely have to have a big crop out of South America this year. And if we don't, you know, you're going to be getting into a very snug situation because clearly it's not just the US, it's wanting to crush beans, you know, to make fuel. I mean, Brazil wants to do the same thing. So it's going to be pretty interesting to see kind of how this plays out. This is an energy move in the soybean sector that has been driving it for some time now, I think. Very much the opposite of the energy move for wheat and corn, which is related to energy because they can't move them out of the black sea area and what's happening with the wars in Iran as well. So how do you put those two things together as you look into tomorrow's report? You know, it's hard to put it all together and make sense of it. I would say this, though, you know, whenever you look at all the geopolitical issues we have, clearly you go into some of these

5:14weekends with a lot of assumptions and then you come out on Sunday evening and you realize a lot in the world has changed. And so, you know, as a grower, what you have to do is you got to try to filter through all that and just ask yourself the question, you know, how does this price look based upon what we've been experiencing the last three years? And to me, if we're snubbing our nose at the best prices we've seen, you know, yes, these corn is what, 13 cents maybe off of the highs for the year, but I mean, clearly Todd, we all know that these are the best prices we've seen the last three or four years now is it can it go substantially higher? Of course it can. But I know a lot of folks that called me today said, hey, I just don't think I've got enough sold and I'm concerned, you know, about getting my rear-end handed to me on this report. You know, what a beautiful decision to make whenever you're selling again at the best prices we've seen in a long time. So, you know, I think you've got to filter through all that Todd and try to try to get it down to the essentials of, hey, can I make money of these prices? And I think that the easy

6:18answer for most of us this year is that we can certainly make them work first of all, second of all, we can make them work a heck of a lot better than what prices look like a year ago. Are you changing your attitude as it's related to on farm storage and are you willing to go further with that? Yeah, I mean, that's the thing Todd is that I've said all along. I thought corn would be and beans would be great property post-harvest. Now clearly whenever you start talking about $5.65, $5.65, you know, July-type prices that we've seen in here, boy, you know, you start to ask yourself that corn that's going in the bin, should I maybe hedge, you know, a little bit of that corn and then wait on the basis to come to me later on. And that's certainly something that I would take a look at at the same time. Do I want to have some corn on the farm that gives me an opportunity to participate in an upmarket? Yeah, but I do think that hedging off some of that risk is probably something we need to strongly consider. So from my vantage point, it's changed. We have to

7:21understand things have changed for the better. And we don't want to get too bullish whenever the market is surged to levels that we haven't seen in the last few years. We have to be very cautious to get more bullish at the high of the market. And we just have to be very cognizant of that. Again, we've got to try to keep this as simple as what we can. Hey, thanks much. I appreciate it. Oh, absolutely. Thank you, Todd. That's Matt Bennett. He is with AgMarket.net. We're now joined by John Jones, soil scientist from the University of Illinois Extension Specialist. Thank you, John, for being with me. When farmers finish up harvest this fall, they'll be fast looking to apply their fall fertilizer. And I'm wondering what kinds of things they need to think about as it's related to the economics and where they might be able to make some decisions related

8:22to map, depth, and their nitrogen applications. Thanks, Todd. So I think this is certainly a very relevant and timely discussion. When we think about decisions or information, specifically, that's needed to make decisions relative to P or K soil tests rule the day. Soil test levels have a very strong relationship. And we've seen that in over many states in across time. Soil tests have a relationship with response of crops to specific nutrients. So an example for phosphorus, the higher soil test values you get, the lower the probability of response of those crops to phosphorus fertilizer. And this fall conditions when we're getting into things like $900 per ton P fertilizer products, if we're getting to a point where those costs are high enough where a decision is to apply or not apply, using soil test to make that determination

9:24has a lot of value. And in fact, right now when we get into conditions where pricing scenarios are less favorable for P or K, we start to think about maybe only annual applications that focus on removal values, but also there are simply simply soil test values that you're not going to find any response to P or K. And we want to avoid applying on those. If we have excessively high phosphorus and potassium numbers, we can allow those to draw down as well without needing to pay for those nutrients. This is when soil testing and soil tests that well represent the diversity of conditions within your field has its highest ROI because you an apply where you need it and not apply where you don't. When you make that statement, what do you mean by well represents when you're soil testing or you're asking somebody to soil test, what pattern do you want them to use? Well, I would say the general two options that most use are two and a half acre grid soil

10:25sampling. So in a very agrited line pattern, zone sampling can also be done. Now zone sampling refers to creating regions or polygons if you're dealing in mapping terminology, but regions of fields that are similar and so you can pull a soil sample from those, that's that region to represent all those similar soils. Generally zones need to be produced from previous yield maps, soil test levels, things like topography or soil series maps are also very helpful. Drainage class is a very useful component to building zones for potassium, for example. And so a zone system is going to need to be trained based off of what you're seeing in your given field. And that may vary by user and software and what your objective is. For the basics though, if people were to go to the agronomy handbook on line, for instance, they'd be able to find some numbers that would give them an idea where their

11:29soil test should be and when they can avoid applying. Yeah, so in general, there's some information about soil testing or excuse me, soil sampling strategies, but then also there's interpretation guidelines for phosphorus and potassium levels within soils and how much should be expected to apply. I will say that we have a large volume of research around the state that's going into refining those numbers now. And we don't find that they're that far off. We see some skewing or some shifting left or right or upper down given specific soils, but generally targeting a soil test value that is, we'll say between 17 and 25 parts per million of P, for example, for a bray one test. At that point, above that point, we don't see a very high probability of response to fertilizer. And so applying the maintenance range within those that range of soil test levels makes a lot of sense. For potassium,

12:29we kind of see that same trend as well when we start to get up to soils above 160 above 200 parts per million, we see a very low probability of response decay. Turn your attention to nitrogen applications in the fall, generally speaking, north of interstate 70 in the state of Illinois, would be in hydroz ammonia when should farmers apply and at what rates and where might they find information? Well, when to apply needs to be determined by soil conditions and obviously weather as well. We want the soil temperature to be below 50 degrees Fahrenheit at the four inch depth and decreasing. So that's not necessarily one day, it's 49 and the next day at 65. We want to see a decreasing trend of soil, soil temperature that reduces the activity of biology within the soil that would convert ammonium, which gets converted from the ammonium gas to nitrate that

13:29could be potentially lost. So we want to look at soil temperatures to guide fall, nitrogen applications. Your rates are going to be determined by what the crop will respond to and what we use for that is a process that's found on the corn nitrogen rate calculator and that's at corn n rate corn n rate calc dot dot org. And essentially what you can do is look through a vast database of hundreds of nitrogen rate trials on farm trials around the state to look at your similar region, previous crop, and then nitrogen and corn pricing conditions. And that will guide you to a rate that has been proven or shown in previous years to maximize profit. How closely? What I mean, when you say to maximize profit, what's the range on that that you talk about as it's related to maximum profit and or if you're well above that number? I should be clear that we're maximizing our

14:30profitability of the nitrogen application. So our economic return to that nitrogen decision. Those ranges usually are about 12 to 14 pounds of ant on either side of an average that's determined. And that's generally acceptable because of the fickle nature of nitrogen, how it behaves within our soil and crop systems. We're trying to get within that 20 to 40 pound target and I think we'd be doing a fairly good job if we could get that rate right. The idea is that within these ranges, we've increased our probability of a profitable nitrogen application that has already maximized yields but then also minimizes the potential loss of nitrogen from our fields into the environment because we're applying what the corn crop needs. The in rate calculator and you can find this simply by googling in rate calculator and it should be one of the first things that pops up is available online. It does ask for projected price at harvest or sales price for the corn as well as price for

15:37the particular in product. You can choose, of course, NH3 or N-hydrogen Sources. However, I think it's important to note that the number that it develops in terms of pounds of N that should be applied is not only representative of pounds of N-hydress or NH3 or whatever source of nitrogen you're using that you have priced in, it's more than that. Yeah, so when we upload and interpret that data, it's looking at the total N applied to that crop. That includes any fall N applied with your P-fertilizers. That also includes any nitrogen that's applied with your spring broadcast applications of herbicide. Any N that's been applied from the previous crop into previous crops harvest into the growing season of 2027. For example, we include in those calculations. So

16:38when you're building your nitrogen management plan for 2027, incorporate all sources of N that are going to be applied. Thank you very much. Thank you very much, Todd. That's John Jones. He is a soil scientist from the University of Illinois. Let's turn our attention now to the global growing regions. Mike Tanour is here. He's with T-Storm, whether that's T-Storm.net online out of Naperville, Illinois. He serves as the president and CEO there. Hi, Mike. Thanks for being with us again. Hey, Todd, thanks again for having me here. Well, there's a little drizzle on site here at the Farm Progress Show, not in Bunaia. Well, that's done, but this is the Farm Progress Show site in Decatur, Illinois, where the soybean association is holding an agronomy day to day. And I'm wondering whether this part ends anything else as it relates to the month of September and what conditions

17:42might be like in the center part of the United States. Well, that's a great question, Todd. And we are in the transition period between the heat wave that we had over the first half of the month to a cooler period that's ahead for the second half of the month. And their transition is starting right about now. And that's why we're seeing some of this rain. So basically what's going to happen here over the next seven to 10 days is that we'll see the heat in the southern areas kind of linger for a little bit while northern growing areas start to turn a lot cooler. That's going to create a very sharp temperature gradient across the middle of the country. And that's the reason that we're starting to see some of this rain. We have several more systems and several more cool fronts that are ahead and those will interact differently, but they all kind of move in the same direction, which is for the central U.S. to turn a lot wetter. The big questions with this regard, how much rain we're going to see and exactly what is going to mean. You know, probably the best rains would be in the western corn belt. So Iowa, Minnesota, and into Missouri, that whole area there,

18:49their late filling soybeans would benefit from that rain, of course. But I think the bigger story here with the upcoming rains is going to help to improve soil moisture in the plains and in the eastern corn belt. And that should help to set the stage for some pretty nice wee planting once we get a couple of weeks out. This will set that stage. It's not been that great to this point for that part of the world, right? Well, it's been pretty dry. I mean, they've been in a pretty incredible heat wave from Kansas through Oklahoma and in the northern Texas for a while. And they're going to stay in that. So, you know, the soil moisture situation isn't all that great even though we did see some rain overnight in Kansas. But the point is that more rain is ahead and that we think that as we're sitting here two weeks from today, we'll be looking at much better conditions for planting wheat. Now, thinking about the beginning of a season or planting or sewing, I would like to move to South America. They have a rainfall issue as well that you've been telling me about. Where is that? Well, that's in southern Brazil. And it's a little bit fascinating to see

19:52what's been happening. They had some pretty big rains over the last one to two weeks. That's very unusual for this time of the year to see heavy totals like this. But the bigger story is that more heavy rain is ahead. We have a pretty big system that I'll move through over the next few days. And then another one about a week out. Once you put all this together, there's no question that you're looking at one of your what it starts the September on record. It's just a matter of what this means. First coin is being planted now. And so that crop is going to be pretty wet by the time we get into the end of the month. And also wheat, that's their main wheat region is all in that southern growing region. And if we just look at the European model and just kind of take it out 14 days, it's basically showing about half of the first crop corn in Brazil. And the wheat is going to have at least three times as normal over the next 14 days. So that's 52 days worth of rain over the next 14 days with conditions already kind of wet. So what does this mean for the real big picture for soybean planting all the fun stuff that starts up in October? I mean, it's a

20:56little hard to say, but certainly unusual to see this wet this early. And before I let you go, is there any new news that's related to El Nino in the coming months and what we can expect? Well, it's all systems go for the El Nino. The big question will be how strong is it? Most of the computer models are showing the strongest El Nino on record by a pretty wide margin. Or records only go back solidly about 50 to 60 years. But just by looking at how strong this one is going to be compared to the five strong ones we've had over the period, you can just easily see this is going to be one of the strongest and probably hundreds of years just based on where the temperatures are. And when we talk about the temperatures, we're talking about the middle of the Pacific Ocean right along the equator. When that water is a lot warmer than normal, we call it an El Nino. And the departure is going to be so big, it's just going to be the warmest that water has been on a real long time. So is that why we're seeing some of the outweather in Brazil and maybe even

21:59the US with all the heat over the last 30 days or so? It means probably tied in there somehow and we'll have to see how it all pans out and keep in mind that the peak strength of El Nino typically happens sometime between the start of November and the end of January kind of in that range. So we have to kind of see where this thing peaks out because once it hits its peak, it rapidly starts to cool and temperatures start to go back toward normal in the ocean. So that's kind of what we're watching there. Hey, thank you much, Mike. I appreciate it. That sounds great. I have a good one. That's Mike Tenerri. He is with T Stormweather T Storm.net online. A couple of things thanks to the Illinois soybean association for hosting me here on the farm progress show site for our remote today. Don't forget that tomorrow USDA will release its a wazdy and crop production reports at 11 a.m. Central time. That will delay the recording of course of our commodity week program. So don't look for it this afternoon. You're listening of course to Illinois Public Media.

23:00It's online at willag.org. ILLAG.org. I'm University of Illinois Extensions Todd Gleason.