WHEAT IS UP 54.5% THIS YEAR AND STILL CLIMBING

🔴 Wheat is up 54.5% this year.

Futures settled 3.1% higher at 784 cents a bushel on Friday, the highest level since February 2023. The weekly gain was 12.1%, the biggest since March 2022.

Corn hit its own three-year high, settling at 536.5 cents. It is up 15.6% in August, on pace for its best month since April 2021, and 21.8% year to date.

CNBC reports the two rallies have almost nothing to do with each other.

Wheat is a shipping story. Russia and Ukraine account for more than a quarter of global wheat exports, and escalating tensions in the Black Sea have damaged export infrastructure. Barchart's William Osnato told CNBC that expectations for near-term Russian shipments have dropped by several million tons because capacity to ship has been badly hit. Insurers are backing away from vessels in the region.

Corn is a crop story. The USDA's August report cut its yield forecast by 2.3 bushels per acre to 180.7, a deeper cut than traders expected, even while projecting the second-largest harvest on record. Pro Farmer's Crop Tour found extreme July heat had done damage after a wet June.

Jim McCormick of AgMarket.Net put it plainly to CNBC: the world expected to be bailed out by US supply, and now that supply is questionable.

Europe adds to both. A heat wave cut wheat production there by roughly 8 million to 10 million tons.

Are you noticing higher food prices yet, or not so far?

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