Wheat and soybeans lost ground overnight. Canola and corn were up and down in fractions.

• Chicago wheat May contract down US45.25cents per bushel to 1057c/bu;
• Kansas wheat May contract down 40.25c/bu to 1070.5c/bu;
• Minneapolis wheat May down 24.75c/bu to 1079.5c/bu;
• MATIF wheat May contract down €11.50/t to €369.75/t;
• Black Sea wheat July contract down $5.50/t to $349/t;
• Corn May contract down 5.5c/bu to 748.5c/bu;
• Soybeans May contract down 46c/bu to 1664.25c/bu;
• Winnipeg canola November 2022 contract up C$7 /t to $968.10/t;
• MATIF rapeseed November 2022 contract up €3.50/t to €757.25/t;
• ASX July 2022 wheat contract down A$12.50/t to $397.50/t;
• ASX Jan 2023 wheat contract down $7/t to $398/t;
• AUD dollar down to US$0.749.

International

Generally good global weather has rain falling across the US Great Plains and a better outlook for the Midwest and Delta regions. Argentina is getting a break from the rain, creating an opportunity for harvest. Improved rainfall prospects are emerging through Central Europe and eastwards into northwest Ukraine.

Shanghai starts China’s biggest COVID-19 lockdown in 2 years on Monday to conduct mass testing and control a growing outbreak in Shanghai as questions are raised about the economic toll of the nation’s “zero-COVID” strategy. Shanghai, China’s financial capital and largest city with 26 million people, had managed its smaller previous outbreaks with limited lockdowns of housing compounds and workplaces where the virus was spreading.

Freight markets rebounded last week with support from China iron ore markets which made their fourth consecutive weekly gain thanks to supply shortages at mills because of COVID related disruptions. Producers in the top steel making city of Tangshan are set to cut or suspend output as their raw material stocks can only feed production for several days while transportation remained constraint due to a temporary lockdown.

Russian tankers carrying oil chemicals and oil products are increasingly concealing their movements, a phenomenon that some maritime experts warn could signal attempts to evade unprecedented sanctions prompted by the invasion of Ukraine. In the week ended March 25, there were at least 33 occurrences of so-called “dark activity” — operating while onboard systems to transmit their locations are turned off — by Russian tankers.