Russian wheat sent lower by new crop and rouble weakness

(Reuters) – Russian wheat export prices fell last week under pressure from the new crop, a weaker rouble [RU/RUB] and lower export tax, analysts said on Monday.

Sanctions-hit Russia reduced its grain export taxes sharply on July 1 to support shipments in the July-June marketing season.

Prices for the new wheat crop with 12.5% protein content and for supply from Black Sea ports fell by $17 to $358 a tonne free on board (FOB) at the end of last week, the IKAR agriculture consultancy said.

Sovecon, another consultancy, said wheat prices for supply in July and August were at $365-$370 a tonne vs $375-$385 a week ago.

Russia exported 340,000 tonnes of grain last week, compared with 250,000 tonnes a week earlier, Sovecon said, citing data from ports.

Wheat prices in the domestic market rose on higher demand from exporters, Sovecon said.

Some foreign traders started to conduct additional checks of farmers, probably to avoid buying any grain from Ukraine, it added.

Ukraine has accused Russia of stealing grain from territories that Russia’s army has seized since Feb. 24. Moscow denies this.

Other Russian data provided by Sovecon and IKAR:

Product: Price at the end Change from week

of last week: earlier

– Domestic 3rd class 13,575 rbls/t +150 rbls

wheat, European part ($222.5)

of Russia, excludes

delivery (Sovecon)

– Sunflower seeds 25,900 rbls/t -1,425 rbls

(Sovecon)

– Domestic sunflower 74,000 rbls/t -1,000 rbls

oil (Sovecon)

– Domestic soybeans 35,125 rbls/t -975 rbls

(Sovecon)

– Export sunflower $1,540/t -$20

oil (Sovecon)

– Export sunflower $1,370/t -$20

oil (IKAR)

– White sugar, $1,013.6/t -$75.7

Russia’s south

(IKAR)

The harvesting data provided by Sovecon as of July 7 *:

All grains: Wheat Barley

Crop, mln tonnes 8.8 5.4 2.8

Crop, as of same 4.1 2.7 1.8

date in 2021

Yield, 4.0 4.0 4.9

tonnes/hectare

Yield, as of same 3.4 3.1 4.1

date in 2021

Harvested area, mln 2.2 1.4 0.6

hectares

Harvested area, as 1.4 0.9 0.5

of same date in

2021

* Russian agriculture ministry stopped publishing harvesting data.

($1 = 61.0000 roubles)

(Reporting by Reuters; Editing by David Goodman)