European market
Geopolitics is once again dominating the prices of agricultural raw materials, this time downwards. US special envoy Steve Witkoff met yesterday with Vladimir Putin in St. Petersburg in order to advance negotiations to end the war in Ukraine. He had met Volodymyr Zelensky the day before in Norway.
The Ukrainian president said he was ready to freeze the current frontline in order to pave the way for negotiations. The Kremlin has declared its willingness to resume trilateral negotiations with Washington and Kyiv around November 10, while continuing to reject the idea of a preliminary ceasefire. Finally, nothing new or concrete after the Steve Witkoff's last trip in September to Moscow and then to Kyiv.
However, the market operators perceived this new act as an additional step towards peace and especially towards the possible reopening of flows in the Black Sea. It didn't take much more to trigger a very big wave of sales on both sides of the Atlantic. The European market is the most affected by this downward pressure as its exposure to the Black Sea flows is strong. For export, Russian and Ukrainian wheats are the direct competitors of EU origins. For imports, Ukrainian corn and rapeseed are historically the first origins that come to balance EU deficit balance sheets on these two products.
It is therefore in this context of anticipation of peace that futures prices closed sharply lower last night on Euronext. Wheat is the most sensitive and therefore shows the sharpest decline with -8.75 €/t closing at 232.75 €/t in December 2026, a low since 11 August.
Corn sees its fall attenuated by the extreme tension of the French balance sheet. The November 2026 contract loses 3.5 €/t to close at 291.25 €/t and preserves its support from the last sessions.
Rapeseed ends the session down -4.75 €/t to 540.25 €/t on the February 2027 Euronext contract, the lowest since 25 August last year. The market, however, was able to rebound by 4 €/t compared to its lows of the day, to 536.25 €/t.
American market
The anticipations of possible peace between Russia and Ukraine reinforced yesterday the selling pressure, in particular of the funds, on the Chicago market. Since the beginning of the conflict in 2022, SRW wheat has been the contract most exposed to this geopolitical situation. So this contract was pressured the most yesterday to finally close on a decline of -7.5 to -16.5 cents per bushel after losing more than 20 cents at the beginning of the session.
Soybeans caught up during the session but nevertheless close on a decline of -3 to -10 cents depending on the contracts. It benefits from export support with the new announcement by the USDA of a sale of 134,000 t to China and 165,000 t to Spain.
The biggest intraday rebound performance was seen in Chicago corn market yesterday, up by 1.25 cents on the close. Buyers came back strongly when the session lows approached the symbolic level of $4.5/bu in December 2026, i.e. a low since last July 13, or almost $1/bu of decline, i.e. -20% compared to the top of last September 2.
Black Sea market
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