Chicago Close: Profit Taking Weighs after Monday’s Big Gains

Jul 26, 2023

After sharp war-related gains a day earlier, Chicago crop futures closed mostly lower on Tuesday.

Chicago wheat closed up its 60-cent limit on Monday, following Russian attacks on ports and grain facilities along Ukraine Danube River – strikes that traders feared could slow the export of grains out of the Black Sea region after Russia backed out of the Black Sea Grain Initiative. Those gains, along with warm, dry forecasts for the Midwest, helped to lift corn and soybeans as well.

But profit taking and uncertainty about what might happen next in the Black Sea, along with changeable Midwest conditions, sent most futures contracts lower today.

The Midwest was mostly dry today, with increasing heat. In parts of the western Corn Belt, highs ranged from 95 to 100 degrees F. However, showers and thunderstorms are in the forecast for the northern and eastern Corn Belt regions for the weekend.

September and December corn each lost 3 cents to close at $5.57 ½ and $5.65 ¼, respectively. August beans fell 7 ¾ cents to $15.15 ½, and November was down 4 ½ cents at $14.20.

September Chicago wheat managed a 2 ¾-cent gain to $7.60 ¼, but September Kansas City was down 5 ¾ cents at $9.12 ¾, and September Minneapolis lost 4 cents to $9.32.

Source : Syngenta.ca

Video: Spring 2026 weather outlook for Wisconsin; What an early-arriving El Niño could mean

Northeast Wisconsin is a small corner of the world, but our weather is still affected by what happens across the globe.

That includes in the equatorial Pacific, where changes between El Niño and La Niña play a role in the weather here -- and boy, have there been some abrupt changes as of late.

El Niño and La Niña are the two phases of what is collectively known as the El Niño Southern Oscillation, or ENSO for short. These are the swings back and forth from unusually warm to unusually cold sea surface temperatures in the Pacific Ocean along the equator.

Since this past September, we have been in a weak La Niña, which means water temperatures near the Eastern Pacific equator have been cooler than usual. That's where we're at right now.

Even last fall, the long-term outlook suggested a return to neutral conditions by spring and potentially El Niño conditions by summer.

But there are some signs this may be happening faster than usual, which could accelerate the onset of El Niño.

Over the last few weeks, unusually strong bursts of westerly winds farther west in the Pacific -- where sea surface temperatures are warmer than average -- have been observed. There is a chance that this could accelerate the warming of those eastern Pacific waters and potentially push us into El Niño sooner than usual.

If we do enter El Nino by spring -- which we'll define as the period of March, April and May -- there are some long-term correlations with our weather here in Northeast Wisconsin.

Looking at a map of anomalously warm weather, most of the upper Great Lakes doesn't show a strong correlation, but in general, the northern tiers of the United States do tend to lean to that direction.

The stronger correlation is with precipitation. El Niño conditions in spring have historically come with a higher risk of very dry weather over that time frame, so this will definitely be a transition we'll have to watch closely as we move out of winter.