Monday Market Briefing -19th January 2026

The January USDA world stock update was not at all as expected. Increasing US corn output from the 25 harvest at this stage surprised a market looking for lower ending stocks not higher. US markets did react bearishly to the news initially but, helped by a weakening Dollar, ended the week close to unchanged as did we. The fact we have a really big pile of grain this year worldwide is not exactly news anymore and there doesn’t appear to be much appetite for more downside now.  That said, the likelihood of a properly bullish picture emerging just receded even further. 

New crop prices are not offering any incentive to carry grain over, so attention will start to focus on getting this season tidied up in as orderly a manner as possible. January is typically a busy month for post-Christmas sellers and we should see a steady flow of farm grain coming forward in the coming weeks.  It’s hard to judge just which markets will struggle to absorb supply, but with nearby months filling up, a lot of trade now is for April-May positions so you can see the summer months will likely be full well before we get there.

Have a good week.