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April 11, 2025

RF Insights: April Market Update

Grayson Daniels, VP of Grain Sales and Procurement, provides a Market Update for April.

Details

Rice Fundamental Highlights

  • USDA March 31 Prospective Plantings showed long grain acres at 2.24 million, down 2% from last year. Arkansas long grain acres were projected at 1,320,000, down only 10,000 acres from last year. Final planted acres will likely be less than the report showed, especially with the recent flooding that will keep river bottoms flooded for weeks.
  • Arkansas medium grain acres showed to be 140,000 acres compared to 117,000 last year. California medium grain acres showed to be 447,000, compared to 459,000 last year.  
  • The USDA April 10 Supply & Demand update raised 2024/25 long grain domestic use but reduced exports resulting in ending stocks decreasing slightly to 76 million bushels.  
  • Long grain rough rice exports continue to lag year-ago levels.  
  • Long grain milled rice exports are on par with year-ago levels.
  • World rice stocks are projected to be ample (30.9% stocks to use ratio).

May '25 Rough Rice Futures

Key:Orange Line: 9-day moving averageBlue Line: 27-day moving average

CBOT May '25 Rough Rice Values (2/14/25 - 4/10/25)

U.S. Long Grain Rice Supply-Demand

U.S. Medium Grain Rice Supply-Demand

CBOT Receipts (as of 4/9/25)

CTFC Commitment of Traders

September '25 Rough Rice Futures

Rice Market Summary

OLD CROP:  

CBOT May ’25 rice futures hit a low of $12.96 on 3/6/25 and quickly bounced back to $14.095 on 3/11/25, however in recent weeks has traded mostly between $13.20 and $13.65.  Milled rice prices in Asia, South America, and the U.S. continue to soften.  

CBOT receipts stand at 732 as of 4/9/25, primarily in McGehee and Diaz.  

NEW CROP:

September futures have lightly traded between $13.30 and $13.75 for the past few weeks. Planted acres for long grain are expected to be lower than the numbers USDA had in their March 31 Prospective Plantings survey. Acres could be down significantly after the recent flooding if the weather isn’t near perfect in the next few weeks. Planted acres for California are expected to be down and Southern medium grain is expected to be up, but that is uncertain as well.

Soybean Fundamental Highlights

  • USDA March 31 Prospective Plantings report showed 83.6 million acres for this year, down 3.5 million acres from last year.
  • The April 10 Supply and Demand report from USDA showed little change from the previous update.  
  • The projected average price remained at $9.95.
  • Ending stocks were reduced slightly to 375 million bushels.
  • World soybean stocks are projected to grow 6% this year compared to last year (a few months ago USDA was forecasting a 21% increase).
  • Traders will be focused on U.S. planting weather and tariff developments with China, Mexico, and E.U. in the coming weeks.

May '25 Soybeans

Key:
Orange Line: 9-day moving average
Blue Line: 27-day moving average

CBOT May '25 Soybean Values (2/14/25 - 4/10/25)

U.S. Soybean Supply-Demand

World Soybean Production & Stocks

November '25 Soybeans

Soybean Market Summary

OLD CROP:

May futures were trading in the low $10 range until the “Liberation Day” tariff announcements on April 2nd and the Chinese retaliation. Futures hit a low of $9.695 on April 7th but quickly rebounded on April 9th after retaliatory tariffs were paused for all countries except China. Soybean meal values have strengthened slightly in recent weeks due to some crush plants slowing production. The soybean oil market has shown some signs of improvement recently. Hopes are high that EPA will drastically increase renewable fuel volumes (RVOs) which should really help the market if that materializes in late April or early May. The massive influx of Chinese used cooking oil (UCO) has slowed considerably, however beef tallow imports from Brazil have spiked which also competes with soybean oil as a biofuel feedstock.  

NEW CROP:

USDA expects new crop soybean acres will drop by 3.5 million acres which should give the market a good base of support as long as exports aren’t reduced more than expected from the tariff wars. USDA will release the first official new crop WASDE report on May 12.