▶ Fall 2026 Corn and Soybean Market Situation and Outlook

0:05
I was going to say good morning, but I guess it’s more of good afternoon at this point.

0:09
So good afternoon.

0:10
Thanks for having me on this right now.

0:13
You should be seeing right now I’m just basically going to talk about corn and soybean situation outlook, what’s going on in the fall as we are at at the harvest or wrapping up or or so where we’re at in for harvest.

0:26
You know as we are progressing through the the harvest as we go to the start kind of of the marketing year.

0:33
So we’re another marketing year starts September 1st is basically what’s kind of like what are we thinking is going to be happening both as harvest goes on and then when we’re starting to think about even for next year.

0:45
I know that’s long ways off it seems like forever sometimes.

0:48
But for planting.

0:49
So what are we thinking is going to happen basically with prices and that? The biggest things that we are looking at, you know, that are kind of impacting prices today, our harvest where we’re at, what’s going on with it, the exports that’s at this time of the year that’s always there particularly for soybeans because this is the prime window for servings for serving exports.

1:17
And then basically the wars that we have both Russia Ukraine, but with ours because it’s basically what that all means as far as for input costs.

1:28
And that’s basically kind of looking at, well, as we look at those, what’s happening with that kind of will make a little bit of a decision on what is going to be the acreage shift between corn, soybeans, the markets already anticipating this information.

1:44
So where are we at, what are we thinking, what’s the market thinking and where do we kind of think what should be happening anyway with prices?

1:53
All right, so that being said, let’s talk about soybeans. First, just as a heads up.

2:02
So what we have here, so these are the graphs that if you look at the National Ag Statistics Service, so NASS, the crop progress reports that we have out here.

2:13
So this is the soybeans one that we are seeing for the week, for the most recent week.

2:20
All right, sorry.

2:22
I have to move my my pictures here because they’re impeding my view of the screen.

2:29
I’m seeing myself only.

2:30
So basically what we’re looking at just to give you this idea.

2:34
So this is for the US, as we kind of just pointed out, September 2026, was weather wise depending on particular areas.

2:42
We talked about it for Wisconsin a little bit here recently, but what we look at September ’26, there was a lot of heavy rainfalls in areas of the Western Corn Belt and then the Central Plains region.

2:54
So especially those like Nebraska, Kansas and especially Iowa.

2:59
So all of those rainfalls basically led to repeated and repeated and repeated harvest delays and then it gave localized flooding and it basically gave them some record-breaking precipitation.

3:11
So all of that was great for soil moisture that they needed in the beginning part for the dryness.

3:18
It also obviously created a lot of field access issues and so forth.

3:23
Some of the states actually in the month of September only saw three days that were suitable for field work.

3:28
So that’s a huge thing when we’re looking at this, when we look at it then where we were going as far as for the harvest and so forth.

3:37
Then the beginning of the month in October 5th, just to give you an idea, Iowa had only 5% of their soybeans harvested compared with typically when we’re looking at a five year average there at about 38%.

3:51
All right, so that was a huge delay there by 18th what we saw.

3:56
So from a national perspective we were quite behind at the beginning of the month, the most recent report that came out.

4:03
So for the beginning of this week here saw that harvest for the most part nationally we’ve caught up.

4:09
So we are at for serving 64% at the beginning of this week of of the soybean harvest was complete compared with and I’m going to say a 5 year average of 64%.

4:22
But in reality it’s only a four year average because there was no October of 2025 saw no report due to the government shutdown.

4:32
So it’s actually only included the 21 through 24 because there was no data for 2025.

4:38
So we’re a little bit just very, pretty much at the same spot, but just a little bit behind.

4:45
Just as since I talked about Iowa to begin with though, Iowa is still significantly behind in the soybeans.

4:51
They’re sitting only at 57% complete relative to where they’re typically at at 74.

4:59
When we look at this from just the perspective then for Wisconsin, just to give you an idea.

5:05
So in 2026 at the beginning of this week, we were sitting at 72% of the soybean crop was harvested relative to again that four year average of 63%.

5:18
So we’ve caught up.

5:20
Where we’re sitting at as far as for that.

5:23
But remember all of that rain, whether it’s in Wisconsin, whether it’s where else it was at all that rain also led to some of the crop condition that we’ve been seeing as it dropped a little bit there in September.

5:39
So crop condition reports are saying that it’s not necessarily a great condition crop that we’ve been harvesting. Where we’re looking at as far As for progress, this is I’m going back, this is basically the October 11th one because when I put this together didn’t have it for the 18th.

5:58
But what I want to point out on this is the weekly.

6:02
So the weekly progress is there where we’re looking at it, but also on some of where we’re sitting, if just to give you an idea, you know the red states, the ones that I kind of mentioned are the ones that are behind the blue states.

6:17
We’re still kind of in that same range right there where we’re just kind of sitting right on par with where we typically are in a five year average.

6:27
Now when we want to, I want to talk about that, we’ve talked about harvest for a little bit, but one of the other reports that came out at the end of September was the grain stocks report, because September 1st is as we are aware is the beginning of the new marketing year.

6:43
So what they look at at the end of the September, they report basically what are the stocks as of September 1st.

6:50
This report basically kind of threw a lot of things into the, the, the market definitely took a response to this because there was a lot of things in it that were a little bit of a surprise.

7:03
So when we look at it for the beginning stocks of the 26-27, which is the ending stocks basically of the 25-26 were soybeans.

7:13
They were lower than they were previously estimated to be.

7:17
So that they basically said in the grain stocks report that the soybean inventory totaled 315.1 million bushels. Off stock,

7:29
Off farm stocks then specifically were reported at 224.7 million bushels and that accounted for 71% of all of the total soybean stocks.

7:41
The this the basically what we’re seeing is that that lower carry in stocks.

7:45
So what we’re carrying over from last year’s into this year though is really going to be more than offset though still by the higher soybean production that we’re expecting.

7:56
And so overall, we’re going to see a bigger percent of bigger production or bigger supply of soybeans for this current marketing year.

8:05
All right, when we look at that stocks report, just to give you some specifics on it.

8:10
So as I said, the stocks were down on it, but the smaller stocks were in those like Iowa, Illinois, but in Wisconsin specifically, we are actually our soybean stocks are up where the majority of the soybean stocks are being held where it’s off farm.

8:28
But on farm stocks are also up by about 3.6 100,000 bushels.

8:37
Excuse me.

8:38
All right.

8:39
So now when we look at the what where I said like, OK, so we have the stocks that are there, but now we also want to look at the production.

8:47
So we’ve kind of talked a little bit about that.

8:49
It was a little bit of a delay that maybe it’s not so great, but and then we had lower stocks.

8:55
But why is it that I’m saying production is going to be up?

8:58
Well, the USDA put in their WASDE report.

9:01
So this comes from again, it’s a crop production report and then WASDE is puts it out there further, but the production they’re saying is going to be at 4.56 billion bushels.

9:14
That’s an increase of 27 million bushels over what they were previously expecting.

9:20
All right.

9:20
So that was that’s up from the September one. Now,

9:24
And so where if you look at this, this is basically their prediction for this harvest.

9:31
You know, you see from July to August, they dropped that yield.

9:34
That’s the blue line.

9:35
There quite significantly.

9:37
Then they increased it in September and then they significantly increased it here again in October.

9:43
That’s what I’m saying.

9:43
So they between September and October, the USDA came back through and said on average in the US, we’re going to, they upped that yield by by 0.3 bushels per acre.

9:54
All right.

9:55
So that’s a huge increase relative to from a September to October report.

10:01
The other thing that they did was they left the number of harvested acres remaining the same out of the 85.9 million acres. All right.

10:11
So when we look at it, it’s the yield basically that’s contributing all of the increase to the aggregate soybean production.

10:19
So it’s all not because of acres, but it’s all because of soybean of of that yield.

10:25
The yield estimates where they saw the increases and on basically were states like Illinois, Maryland, Michigan, North Dakota, so forth. Higher month to month harvests, and those basically offset the lower estimates of production in the states such as Wisconsin.

10:44
So where we were looking at that, that’s one of the big things that we saw those stateside increases.

10:50
We said we saw between September and October the USDA come through and say that we’re going to have a 54 bushels per acre average in the state of Wisconsin.

11:02
That’s down 1 bushel relative to what they were said we would have in September.

11:08
Now where I’m looking at for.  Let’s switch a little bit to the demand side.

11:16
Demand, obviously at this time of the year, the markets tend to focus mostly on the supply side, so on harvest and what’s happening with harvest.

11:25
But we can’t deny demand, especially for soybeans because at this time of the year, this is the prime time between September and January is the majority of the soybeans that we export.

11:39
And so we really have to look at that demand side as well.

11:44
What we’re seeing here is that we know that sales are up about 364 million bushels year over year.

11:51
So that’s a 74% increase.

11:54
The biggest thing about that is though, as if if you think about it, it’s because of the return to China or not return to China, but the return of China.

12:03

12:03
So China’s return to the market basically brought in about 414 million bushels.

12:09
That’s where they were.

12:10
That’s what the,

12:12
The sales are for this year to date so far relative to if we looked at it for two years ago when the last time we had the report they were in when we did before the trade wars, it was 335 million bushels.

12:26
So that’s that’s a big thing for us with that, that return there.

12:31
That’s very helpful for soybeans.

12:33
So especially given that the higher soybean supply, that’s soybean export because the USDA came back through then and said with the higher supply with the return of China, we’re basically going to increase the expectation for soybean exports by about 10 million bushels.

12:51
And we’re going to put it that we’re going to export 1.7 billion bushels in this marketing year.

12:57
Now what we also saw is when we’re looking at it, the other big demand product for soybeans is crush.

13:05
The August soybean crush was reported at 209.6 million bushels.

13:12
That was lower than we expected and there was some seasonal downtime that they were expecting, but it was still lower than what they expected.

13:20
What they said USDA, the ERS has not changed on their forecast for the the September month.

13:28
And so that’s still standing at basically the same where it where this is is a little bit concerning is that when we look at the August and we look at the September this the August month, it’s the first time that it’s been lower year over year since March of 2025.

13:43
So this isn’t off to a great start given the fact that the USDA estimates that we’re going to 130 million bushels of of soybean crush and yet we’re down and we’re starting the year kind of down.

13:56
The other part about it is that when we think about where soybeans go, the majority of our soybeans that are exported, so this is soybeans go to China and where we’re looking at for soybeans.

14:11
And within the crush of China, we know that China’s soybean crushing is basically facing significant overcapacity right now. Given that given the fact that the total per capita animal protein that they’re using is probably peaked, given declining population and so forth of that, basically what we’re looking at is that this increased demand of soybean is probably at this plateau.

14:39
So that’s where we’re looking at.

14:42
So for that soy meal consumption for China, it’s pretty much plateaued.

14:46
So if we’re seeing a decline here in the United States of the crush, China’s not going to net want as much of it.

14:53
That’s a bit concerning from it for this year now, sorry, zip through.

14:59
Let’s go to corn.

15:01
Corn, basically this is just your September 1 corn stocks again, 26 versus 25.

15:08
So what you’re seeing is the change here.

15:12
So corn we see that again those stocks both on farm and off farm have increased for us.

15:20
Wisconsin is up as well.

15:22
We have in the stocks report that the USDA put out in in September 30th, we saw that there was 173 million bushel increase to the beginning stocks, so meaning for the the start of this year.

15:34
So that’s the carryover that we had from last year.

15:37
All right.

15:38
When we look at that for the corn stocks and where that’s coming from, off farm stocks for the US were up 400 million bushels from relative to where they were at a year ago.

15:50
On farm stocks are up 144 million bushels.

15:53
Illinois saw the largest year over year change in their off farm, whereas Nebraska saw the largest year over year change in their on farm stocks.

16:04
So that’s just a little bit of an idea of where those stocks are being held and so forth.

16:10
What this means though is that given the increase in the bushels and as I talk about some of of the others right now, our beginning bushels or beginning stocks where we start for this marketing year on September 1st was changed to 2.1 billion bushels.

16:29
All right.

16:29
That’s the largest beginning stocks that we have had since 2019-20 where they were pegged at 2.2 billion bushels, crop progress reports.

16:43
So where I’m looking at it for 2018 or for, I mean for October 18th for corn in the 18 states that produce over 90% of the corn, it’s 44% were harvested completion relative to 52% in the five year average.

17:04
As we kind of talked about, the crop condition has dropped compared to where we were earlier and for week of October 18th, the good to excellent rating for the US corn crop was at 56%.

17:21
Wisconsin specifically is where we are at 24% complete for harvest relative to a 29% average for the four year average or five year average.

17:34
But our crop condition good to excellent is sitting at 60% when we look at the month to month change in the corn production basically for what the USDA was saying as far as that.

17:48
So we are up in our corn production in the in Wisconsin about 1.1% relative to what they were thinking it would be in September.

17:57
But it’s basically as you can see in the Gray states where we’re looking pretty much the same and where it’s going to be down basically in the orange states.

18:07
What that means then is when we start looking at this, this is basically again yield.

18:12
As we started with the USDA predictions for this marketing year, we see this again.

18:18
The significant drop in yield prediction from the in the July report was done in August, went down again in September and then they they increased it again by 2.7 bushel acres for the October report.

18:31
So between September and October, the USDA has now come through and set on average in the United States we’re going to suddenly have another 2.7 bushel acres.

18:40
That is a gigantic increase.

18:43
The 2026 corn production estimates then were raised to where we’re going to have a production of about 16 billion.

18:52
That’s a increase between September and October.

18:54
A prediction of basically of 234 extra million bushels.

18:59
It’s all attributable.

19:01
It’s all attributed to that 2.7 bushel per acre increase.

19:05
So now we’re sitting at an average for the US at 181.2 bushels per acres.

19:11
All right, nearly half of that 2.7 and of that 234 million bushels is coming from the state of Nebraska alone.

19:22
They basically increased the corn bushels per acre in Nebraska by 11 bushels per acre.

19:34
That was the increase from September to October.

19:37
All right, so there’s been increases in other states, Kansas, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota, they have all combined to have some increase, but the biggest chunk of it is coming from Nebraska right there.

19:48
So what that means is that we’re seeing a lot of people who are very, very skeptical on that this increase in that they’re thinking like, wait a minute, wait a minute, USDA got it wrong.

19:58
And they’re probably going to start making some revisions downward again between now and January.

20:03
All right, Those arguments, both sides.

20:07
So it’s the largest increase we’ve ever seen.

20:10
Largest, largest increase month over month since 2005, not ever, but since 2005.

20:16
And then the largest change from October where we’ve seen that was basically in 2010, but that’s when they slashed it a bunch.

20:25
What we will see if we look at the USDA and how they make revisions on this, you can typically see in the last five years, we have seen revisions between the October and the January report of averages, kind of anywhere from 4.5 bushel lower between between October and January in 24-25 to 3.5 bushels higher between October and January in 23-24.

20:54
So they can make some changes on it, but we just aren’t really sure where we’re at. Based off of the fact that they just did this giant increase and based off of some of the historical ways in which the USDA goes about this.

21:09
I would learn more to the fact that they will.

21:12
We will see more yield increases between now and January for corn.

21:16
Then we will see them come back through and cut.

21:19
Even though it’s skeptical, I just think that they’re going to probably inch their way up more with the yield between now and January.

21:28
What all that means then is where we’re looking at it as far as ending stocks, right?

21:33
So we had this big increase of stocks.

21:36
We have an increase in production.

21:38
So that gives us a substantial revision to the ending socks for this year of 282 million bushels.

21:45
And that’s basically saying our socks to use.

21:48
That puts a lot of pressure then on those corn prices.

21:52
All right, let’s talk about demand for just a minute real quick.

21:56
Just to give you an idea, you know, some people we had the the the President Trump met with China’s president.

22:07
Here recently, basically.

22:09
And so the hope is for corn to be able to be exported to China.

22:15
Right now, the hope is that it’s going to revert back.

22:17
It did get included in the list of the US ag products to receive that import tariff cut.

22:22
So hopefully it should revert back to the most favored nation of 1%.

22:26
The thing is though, even if it’s only a 1% above it, China is still saying right now that is still not economical for them to import US corn.

22:34
So it’s they’re saying it’s still too high.

22:38
Couple that with the idea that we’re off to a lackluster start, so we’re down 33% relative to what we were exported at this point last year.

22:47
So that’s down significantly.

22:49
If that continues it this way, we are sitting where we would be estimating about a 2.5 billion bushels of exports for corn relative to the USDA’s estimate of 3.3 billion bushels.

23:02
Now we could pick that up quickly.

23:05
So I wouldn’t necessarily say that’s all this, but the market will pay attention to that and especially by January if we haven’t picked some of this up then that’s really going to be weighing on the market.

23:16
All right.

23:17
Ethanol where we’re looking at a gas demand is down some there.

23:22
Ethanol where we’re looking the year to date, year to date ethanol production is 1% year over year.

23:31
But if I’m looking at like that was on that particular week for October 2nd, we were up 1%.

23:37
But if I’m looking at year to date, so from January to October, we’re down relative to what we were had produced in 2025.

23:46
The stocks however are up on that.

23:49
So there’s a lot of things going on with here.

23:51
There’s a short term production estimates that the EIA is planning through that, but there’s not a lot of expectations for huge increases in the ethanol area to help bolster that demand.

24:04
Where are prices going to go?

24:08
The trend in soybeans is still considered higher right now.

24:13
So even though there was a sell off on that from this, the October between now and January, the trend is still,

24:20
The expectation is that it’s going to go higher for it.

24:23
We could see that.

24:24
Basically we know we have a record crop.

24:26
The bearish things have built into it.

24:28
We’ve had big increases of acres in.

24:32
We’re likely going to see big increases in acres.

24:34
I didn’t talk about cost of production on this, but there’s probably going to be about a 2 million shift in acres between corn and soybeans for 2027.

24:46
At least that’s the expectation right now given cost and given the current ratio between corn and soybeans.

24:52
So all of this is really basically a bearish thing on soybeans.

24:56
But when we look at the bullish side of it, given the fact that there’s a little bit of a quality issue.

25:01
Stocks to use is 6.9%. Sales are almost 2 times percent and crush there is expected to span.

25:09
There’s some things holding it, but down a little bit.

25:13
But still expectation wise is that it should be the same or growing a little bit.

25:17
So relatively we should be looking at the current trend is for soybeans still to hold the same to be higher between now and January.

25:28
All right, when we look at corn, corn carryover, it’s a there’s a lot more bearish aspects for corn.

25:35
The carryover is the highest we’ve seen since 19.

25:39
The export commitments are down and the demand has turned softer, right.

25:43
The things that we have going bullishly for it is expectations right now is that there’s going to be a 2 million.

25:51
Again, this is all holding today.

25:53
So we have some obviously months before we look at this, but the market will start building this into it is the 2 million shift in acres between corn and soybeans.

26:02
So I would say cautiously higher that we will follow the seasonality of this right now between now and January.

26:11
But I’m saying cautiously because there’s a lot of things that can come through, particularly if the USDA keeps adding to those yields and that that that could turn that softer even still between now and January.

26:25
All right, so that’s my story.

26:29
If you have questions or so I can take them now or otherwise you can always e-mail me or call me.

26:36
Well, thank you, Brenda.

26:39
Yeah, if anyone has a question, please throw it in the chat.

26:42
Raise your hand in the in the box there.

26:45
But one question quick, Brenda, since we got a little bit of time, how does USDA go about estimating this?

26:53
Cause those of us that kind of follow the markets, you’ll see a lot of argument this time of year, USDA got it wrong.

26:59
How can you be off 11, you know, 11 bushel per acre in, in a state like Nebraska?

27:05
So how does USDA go about this?

27:07
And then is there a, is there a check and balance with between what private industry estimates and what USDA says is out there or what’s that process for kind of coming to that final number that a lot of farmers will be skeptical and say that’s not what’s out there based on who they talk to. Right.

27:28
The USDA doesn’t really do a check and balance with private industry per se before they come back out through not officially how they get their numbers.

27:36
Basically it’s it is those surveys.

27:38
And so in some ways when you know you get those surveys from the USDA, it is it is vitally important to fill those out and fill those out accurately because if you are putting in incorrect or misinformation types of things or not filling them out, then that is basically making it so that we don’t really have this transparency and that’s where some of those errors come from.

28:04
OK.

28:05
And then I think another question and if Josh is kind of hanging around might be part of it.

28:11
Has any of this looking out into the futures market, has the the weather prediction of El Nino or strong El Nino, how long does that, so maybe for Josh first, how long is that prediction to last?

28:26
And then does that get into the next growing season?

28:28
Is that already affecting a futures market Brenda on what what you’re seeing?

28:33
So maybe Josh, if you could answer the first part, how long do we expect this predicted super El Nino to last?

28:39
If that carries into next year, then Brenda, how does that, are you seeing a ripple effect in those futures markets, you know, well into next year?

28:49
Yeah, Jerry, thanks for that question.

28:51
I’m looking at what like the probability that we’re going to be like in strong to very strong El Nino.

28:57
Looking at the chart that I showed on my slides earlier, it looks like through right, right about like through March.

29:02
Is that when we’re expected to kind of keep that stronger El Nino in that stronger El Nino phase?

29:08
So I think that, you know, through the winter, you know, as we get the three month outlooks that will continue to come out.

29:13
So maybe like by midwinter, we’ll have more of an idea as to like what the spring could look like.

29:17
I will say that at least in Wisconsin, the strongest correlation between like our climate and like the El Nino La Nina phase is usually during the winter months.

29:26
It’s a little bit hazier during the warmer times of the year.

29:30
So all that to say, I would say it’s still kind of too early to say like what like March, April and so on is going to look like.

29:38
Thanks.

29:40
And I would say right now the markets aren’t so much looking at like the the weather effect, they’re looking at it for the current one and how it’s affecting harvest.

29:50
But then the mark of the next one is that they’re going to look at is like those cost of production, what are the current prices relative to it.

29:58
So to as as people try to determine what, because the next guessing game is how many acres are going to be planted in each one.

30:06
So those are the big things that will impact it have a greater impact right now, at least until probably you’re talking about that April time frame when that’s when they start looking at weather again.

30:17
Great, thanks.

30:21
And then one question or maybe Brenda, can you maybe provide some, some, I guess promotion for farmers to start marketing or come up with marketing plans versus meet, you know, always just selling the current price or taking that cash price?

30:39
And what can farmers do to maybe capture something that’s a little bit better further out into the marketing year?

30:45
Oh, definitely, yes.

30:46
I mean, if you are, I mean cash marketing, there’s, you know, there are people like that.

30:51
We do this and we’ve built, you know, a lot of on farm storage to be able to say, hey, this is when I’m going to be able to go about it.

30:59
But I mean, it’s like what we’re seeing it, you know, I mean, if you look at all the data, First off, if you actually have a marketing plan, you’re going to on average increase your increase your, your price per bushel throughout the year anywhere from $0.10 to $0.30.

31:17
All right?

31:17
So depending on how you’re doing it.

31:18
And that’s even just then, like say, hey, I was gonna do this a little bit every month because there are specific times of the years when it makes the best, most sense.

31:29
Like for me, as I pointed out, like right now I’m making an assumption that if you’re harvesting, you have a, and you don’t have it already sold, then you have a place to be able to put it on your farm.

31:42
If you haven’t sold last year’s on that and you haven’t sold this year’s, then you’re in for where you’re just selling it at a time.

31:49
That’s not great, right?

31:52
And there are unfortunately so, so I I, I loathe to say don’t do anything.

31:59
It depends on the situation.

32:01
But if you haven’t pre sold your harvest crop this year right now, So what you’re harvesting this year and if you I would be holding off on doing anything right at this point before trying to make any more sales for throughout the whole.

32:16
And I’m going to give you assumption you have somewhere to be able to store it, you know, and if you don’t, then that’s that’s just the unfortunate part where it’s like this is when you want to try to do those marketing so that you can gain that extra cent, those extra cents.

32:31
Typically where we look at it, you know, you don’t want to necessarily pre sell everything, you know, ’cause you want to have that option to be able to have some production risk if yields aren’t so great or if you have a hail or something that comes through it.

32:46
But like for this year, you know, most of most were like saying that you should have been 70% sold, you know, by that September 1st, then you wouldn’t have had some of those markets when the price dropped out because of some of those surprise aspects with the harvest, you know, so there’s always advantages to it.

33:07
I understand it’s challenging, but I would encourage you if you’re, if you haven’t done so or and you’re nervous about it just to reach out. Extension’s got some great resources on just even some of the basics on how to how to develop that marketing plan.

33:22
All right.

33:23
Thank you, Brenda.