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Jun 18 | Closing Market Report · Closing Market Report

• cmr260618 The June 18, 2026, Closing Market Report highlights a general downturn in agricultural futures, with corn, soybeans, and wheat closing lower amid lighter-than-expected weekly export sales and traders seeking neutral positions ahead of the Juneteenth holiday. Market analysts note that while recent weather events caused localized crop damage, favorable soil moisture across the U.S. Corn Belt has largely alleviated drought concerns. A stationary jet stream is forecast to bring continued rainfall and cooler-than-average temperatures to the central United States, creating generally ideal growing conditions for the remainder of June and July. Conversely, a severe heatwave in Western Europe, particularly in France, is actively threatening both winter wheat and corn production, contrasting with more stable conditions in the Black Sea region. The broadcast also outlines opportunities for producers to capture higher profit margins by contracting premium crops, such as non-GMO and organic varieties, provided they account for the necessary segregation and management costs. Finally, the University of Illinois and Purdue University announced their respective Weed Science Field Days for June 24 and 25, offering self-guided public tours of new active herbicide ingredient trials and weed management strategies. 01:06 Ag Markets with Curt Kimmel, @AgMarket_net 09:06 Weed Science Field Days at ILLINOIS and Purdue 13:09 Premium Opportunities for Row Crop Markets 16:02 Ag Weather with Mike Tannura, Tstorm.net Todd Gleason: From the Land Grant University in Urbana-Champaign, Illinois, this is the Closing Market Report. It is the 18th day of June 2026. I’m Extension’s Todd Gleason. Coming up, we’ll talk about the commodity markets with Matt Bennett. He is at agmarket.net. Aaron Hager, Weed Scientist at the University of Illinois, will be here to tell us all about next Thursday’s event on campus, the South Farms Weed Science Field Day, and he’ll point you to Purdue’s, which is next Friday. You can do them back-to-back; they’re worth the travel, for sure. And then, as we wrap up our time today, we’ll talk about the weather forecast across the United States and Western and Eastern Europe with Mike Tannura. He is at tstormweather.net online out of Naperville, Illinois. We’ll do all of that on this Thursday edition of the Closing Market Report from Illinois Public Media, online, on demand at willag.org. announce: Todd Gleason services are made available to WILL by University of Illinois Extension. Todd Gleason: July corn for the day settled at $4.175, down 3.5 cents on this Thursday afternoon, the last trading day of the week. September at $4.2525, down 4.25. December at $4.44, 4.75 lower. July soybeans, 9.25 lower at $11.2275. November, $11.4275 a bushel, down 6.5 cents. Bean meal futures, $3.50 lower. Bean oil, down $1.85. Wheat at $6.0575, the July soft red, 7 cents lower there. The December at $6.3025, down 6.5. And the July hard red at $6.44, down 8.5 cents. Live cattle futures in Chicago down $2.225. Feeder cattle off 82.5 cents, and lean hogs up 22.5 cents for the day. 01:06 Ag Markets with Curt Kimmel, @AgMarket_net Todd Gleason: Curt Kimmel from agmarket.net now joins us. Matt Bennett is out of the office this afternoon. Hi, Curt, thanks for being with us. Kind of an interesting day in Chicago today. Futures were lower in both corn and soybeans. Can you tell me what happened there? Curt Kimmel: Well, we priced in a little bit of demand this morning. We saw 132,000 tons of beans committed to China, 120,000 tons of beans to unknown destinations. Then there was 285,000 tons of corn to Mexico. So those were confirmed, those were rumored. There are ideas of a lot more interest from China, but there was no big confirmation from that. Then also, we saw the weekly export sales report. We sold about 1.1 million tons of old corn and 519,000 tons of new corn, and that was lower than expectations. Same thing on the beans, about 424,000 tons of old, and some new crop bean sales, of course. We had the pop, we had some lows here this week that met some downside objectives and saw some follow-through. With a three-day weekend in front of us, I think traders wanted to get back to a neutral position. On the weekly chart, it’s encouraging too. We finished the week with a weekly price reversal to the upside. It’s going to be important for the market to catch here and build some stability and see if demand comes in at these lower price levels. We’ve got Brian Split, our ag market team technical guy, kind of says we’ve got some opportunities here to see some recovery, but no real big huge up here as the growing season has a tendency to trend a little lower here as long as we keep getting rain. And that’s going to be the big thing next week, see what the crop conditions report, Todd. There was some significant damage in some areas with wind, hail, and also, we’ve got some pretty yellow-looking corn in some areas. Todd Gleason: We will see what the crop conditions look like on Monday afternoon, those come out at 3:00 Central Time. In that mean space, this is the second of three, three-day holidays, Memorial Day, Juneteenth, and then July 4th that come in about a five-and-a-half week period. The market hasn’t really made too much note, I don’t think, of the Juneteenth holiday yet. Sometimes there are turns on Memorial Day, sometimes there are turns on July 4th. Do you suppose it just doesn’t see a cadence with it that causes that to be the case? I am wondering, three-day holidays can be an issue, but this one doesn’t seem to have been so far. Curt Kimmel: Well, you have to remember, giddy up, you’re the horse, about anything is possible here. So it might be the first time that we could see something spark. But the major holidays basically, particularly the 4th of July coming up, that’s more associated with a lot more weather input and that’s a significant benchmark. If we’re dry, we really accelerate. If we get some rain, we roll over. So as far as the Juneteenth, I don’t know, we’ll see what happens. We’ve got some major world events right now that we could come in here next week and see something upside down Sunday night, Monday morning, to make it a more significant three-day weekend type of news thing. But that’s something history is going to start to record over time because, as you mentioned, this is a new holiday for the most part. Todd Gleason: And finally, before I let you go, what are farmers when they’ve been calling and talking to you, asking about? Are they simply asking about the weather and the wetness? Fundamentally whether China is going to come in? What kinds of things are they wondering or worried about? Curt Kimmel: Well, it varies a lot. The main thing is to add to the high on this new crop. A lot of the old beans were sold last fall, this winter, corn has been pushed out the door here. But new crop sales have been a little skinny in through here. So a lot of the emphasis is to use some type of event here during the growing season to get caught up on new crop sales. If you’re in an area that received some damage, there are some producers out there that have ordered extra bags. I mean, they’re still optimistic on yield, they’re wanting to get some stuff priced on strength. I did not visit with a whole lot of producers that suffered some crop damage just yesterday overnight, just due to the fact that it’s going to take a few days to see how the crop comes out of it. That first wind gust a week or two ago, it leaned it over, it came back, but some of the media shows the worst-case scenario where it is just plain snapped off. Todd Gleason: And finally, anything in the other markets, livestock or outside, that we ought to discuss? Curt Kimmel: Well, on the beef sector, I think we’ve got to keep an eye on it. We’ve been consolidating sideways here and we’re in a position now where we’re due to go one way or the other. The thing is, this screwworm fly larvae continues to make national news in through here. The market’s done a fairly well job of handling that and deciphering it. But the main feature on the meat side is the cookout featuring is starting to pick up, so hopefully the weather will straighten out here where we can fire up the grills. Todd Gleason: Thank you much, I appreciate it. Curt Kimmel: You bet, Todd, take care. Todd Gleason: Curt Kimmel is with agmarket.net. Joined us on this last trading day of the week for the Closing Market Report. It’s a Thursday afternoon. I’ll speak with Matt’s colleague this afternoon, Jim McCormick by the way, for our Commodity Week program. Along with Garrett Toay of agtradertalk.com and Mike Tannura of globalcomresearch.com. I’ll post that not probably before 6 o’clock, but well after that tonight for use tomorrow and over the weekend online at willag.org and on many of these radio stations as well. Again, the markets are closed tomorrow in observance of the Juneteenth holiday. 09:06 Weed Science Field Days at ILLINOIS and Purdue Todd Gleason: A week from today, the annual Weed Sciences Field Day will be held. Aaron Hager puts that program together. He told us about its history, how the day has evolved from an industry-only event to one open to the public, and a couple of good reasons to drive a great distance to be on-site right here at the University of Illinois next Thursday, the 24th, and then Friday, the 25th at Purdue. Aaron Hager: The University of Illinois Weed Science Field Day, when I started here at the university 33 years ago, was actually not open to the public. It was more of a field day that we had for the companies who were sponsoring the research that we were doing, essentially looking at multiple new active ingredients. It was not uncommon years ago to maybe have three, four, perhaps even five or six brand new active ingredients that we were asked to evaluate by the registrants. And we had plots literally all over the South Farm. We restricted it, or did not publicize it, other than to our company contacts and those organizations and registrants who were sponsoring the field research trials. But obviously, with the consolidation of the industry that really got going probably in the late 1990s, early 2000s, we finally made the decision that we can invite the public to this. We’re obviously not looking at as many new active ingredients, we didn’t really have the concern that somebody may be pulling soil cores to try to analyze what this new active ingredient might be. I forget what actual year it was, but when we opened it up to the public, we really had a great response. A lot of local farmers, retail applicators, some even would travel two or three hours to get here to look at the plot signs. We had a couple gentlemen for consecutive years who would drive all the way from Kentucky to look at our field trials. Once we made that decision, we actually coordinated our date selection with the weed science program at Purdue University. For years now, we’ve hosted our Weed Science Field Day, and then Purdue has scheduled theirs typically for the day after ours. So if there are individuals like the two gentlemen I alluded to from Kentucky who would like to tour both field projects back-to-back, it’s worked out really great. We’ve been fairly consistent for several years, right around 100 people will show up for it. It’s basically a self-guided tour. We’ll have the signs in front of all the plots with the treatments on there. There’ll be a booklet that has all the experiments in there. Signs will be on the first replicate, but if somebody would like to see how that particular treatment performed in the second and third replicates, you could look that particular trial up in the field day book and then go look at the individual replications at your leisure. The entire weed science crew will be out there at the farm that day. So if people have any questions about any treatment or about any other weed science-related topic, feel free to stop by and ask us. Todd Gleason: Aaron Hager is an Extension Weed Scientist at the University of Illinois. The annual field day on campus is next Thursday, June 24 on the South Farms. Search 2026 University of Illinois Weed Science Field Day for complete details. You may do the same for the 2026 Purdue University Weed Science Field Day. It, as Aaron pointed out, is on the following day, Friday, June 25. 13:09 Premium Opportunities for Row Crop Markets Todd Gleason: Premium crops, distinct from conventional yellow corn and soybean, include white corn, non-GMO, identity-preserved, hybrid-specific, and organic varieties. They’re called premium because farmers growing them can demand a higher price or premium to the going price for the commodity crop version. Sometimes these are hard to grow, but others are not, for instance, white food-grade corn, says Kelsey Graber. Kelsey Graber: Definitely, that’s one of the lower-hanging fruit and easiest to enter. Reaching out to them, there are limits to how much they’ll buy, but that’s a great way to enter. I know that they work with the Andersons in Mansfield, Illinois. But we also work with organics into them as well, so that’s something to consider. Todd Gleason: The them in this case is Frito-Lay. It has a plant in east-central Illinois. Now Kelsey Graber works for Clarkson Grain. It is a company which deals exclusively with premium crops. Kelsey Graber: So we handle straight non-GMO and organic. Everything comes into our corn plant in Cerro Gordo or our soybean plant in Mattoon. We have basic non-GMO white corn, non-GMO yellow corn, but then we also get into hybrid-specific or variety-specific soybeans in Mattoon. Most of our soybeans are being cleaned and sent to Japan, Southeast Asia for tofu, soy sauce, soy milk. Protein levels are very specific, hilum color is very specific. And our corn, it’s a little less labor-intensive as far as segregation, but those are just some of the opportunities available. Todd Gleason: These premiums, she says, can have a positive impact on a row crop producer’s income, but that does come at a management cost. Kelsey Graber: I think just understanding the premiums and also a lot of these are contracted grower programs. So make sure you’re reaching out early and getting into these programs. For instance, we’re going to roll out our non-GMO buying program and premiums in September and that will be for the 2027 crop. And then organics roll out in December. These programs fill up fast. Also, seed availability can be limited as well. If you’re interested in it, I would encourage you to start looking into those opportunities between now and August. Todd Gleason: Premium crops such as white corn, non-GMO, and organic differ from conventional yellow corn and soybeans. Information about these kinds of premium crops can be found at clarksongrain.com along with your local elevators, seed dealers, and grain companies. 16:02 Ag Weather with Mike Tannura, Tstorm.net Todd Gleason: Let’s turn our attention to the growing regions across the planet. Mike Tannura is here. He’s with Tstorm Weather in Naperville, Illinois, serves as the president and CEO there. Hi, Mike, thanks for being with us today. I’d like to talk generally about Corn Belt weather, maybe up into the spring wheat regions as well, because it seems as though it’s been an interesting spring, but a really good early summer. What can you tell me about the moisture we have at this time? Mike Tannura: Well, soil moisture as it sits today is pretty ideal. Only about 10 to 20% of US corn, soybeans, and spring wheat were dry over the last 30 days. And that’s quite a change from where we were a month ago. You might recall that it wasn’t all that long ago that we were talking about a major drought out in the Plains, and that was extending into parts of the Corn Belt. Well, that entire story is now over with, and we’ve seen some pretty great rains across a pretty wide area. The reason for this, Todd, is that the jet stream is basically lined up right on top of us. Going forward, we don’t expect it to change position by very much over the next 10 to 14 days, and maybe even a little bit beyond that. So as long as the jet stream remains right on top of us, we’re going to continue to see more of these rain and thunderstorm events. Todd Gleason: Is this jet stream I would think of as the typical jet stream because it’s bringing cooler air out of Canada and then looping around, or is it just a flat westerly kind of jet stream? Mike Tannura: It’s lined up a little bit from northwest to southeast, and with that type of configuration at this time of the year, it brings in some pretty strong energy for June standards. That makes it relatively easy for that stronger energy to interact with tropical air and then develop these pretty big thunderstorm clusters. We had a pretty good example of that yesterday across parts of Illinois, and we also had an example of that just about a week ago. Unfortunately, more examples of this are going to come up for parts of the central US, not only with some pretty big rain events but also some pretty strong to severe storms that will do some damage in different areas. Todd Gleason: What kinds of things are you looking at and how much rainfall, when does it come, those sorts of details? Mike Tannura: We’ll see a little more rain today and again tomorrow in parts of the Corn Belt, but for the most part, pretty quiet over the next 48 hours. Once we get into Saturday and Sunday, another major system is going to move across the central US, and that should develop some pretty heavy rainfall across the southern two-thirds of corn and soybeans. So pretty much along and south of Interstate 80, just as a general rule. Another 1 to 2 inches of rain looks like it’s on the way for a pretty big chunk of each crop, and even the northern areas will get a little bit of rain even though totals won’t be quite as much. So that’s kind of the next big event to watch for this weekend. Once we get beyond then, we’ll see a little bit of a lull next week with just a few showers here and there kind of like we’re seeing today and again tomorrow. But then there’s another system out there, this one probably starts up about a week from now and then continues into the following weekend, and that’ll bring another rain event to parts of the central US, if not most of it, 7 to 10 days from now. Todd Gleason: That will finish out the month of June with a great deal of rainfall, I would think across the bulk of the Corn Belt, more than average. And then what happens in July? Mike Tannura: That’s a great question, and we can look at it from two different perspectives. If we look at it from a purely weather forecasting standpoint, it’s very hard to say because we can only look out maybe 5, 10, 15 days if we’re lucky and get some idea of weather. Beyond that, it’s a little bit too hard to say. But if we look at it from a different angle, Todd, we don’t think we have a whole lot in the way of heat coming up, and it’s primarily because of what’s happening now. If you look at rainfall across the 7-state Corn Belt in the month of June, we’re going to end up being at least one inch wetter than normal, if this forecast holds up, which we think it will. On top of that, it also will be at least a little bit cooler than normal. We’ve only seen this five times since 1971 where we’re pretty wet and we’re a little bit cool. In those scenarios, we don’t tend to see many problems after that. Julys following that type of setup, like the one we’re going to be in now, were all cooler than normal, so we didn’t have any big heat in July, and rainfall was mostly near or above normal. So there’s not too many examples of a sudden change to a weather problem. In August, weather varied a little bit more, but in the end, most of the corn crops were good, and most of the soybean crops were good, but we never saw the really great corn crops or the really great soybean crops, primarily because there probably was a little bit too much water in some of these areas. Todd Gleason: If things are good here, let’s go on the hunt for something a little different. Are there places in the Northern Hemisphere that are experiencing difficulty with weather related to growing of crops? Mike Tannura: The only one is across Western Europe. We’ve seen a pretty big heat wave develop this week and that’s going to continue all the way into July. That’s affecting both their winter wheat and their corn crops. And that is going to be a problem, especially in France, where there’s very little rain ahead. Even parts of Germany and Poland aren’t going to see all that much, though they’ve had a little bit of a better rainfall setup in recent weeks. So that’s the main area to watch, but just keep in mind, Todd, that Europe as a whole produces around 55 million metric tons of corn every year compared to the US at around 400 to 410. A really big problem for Europe would only be similar to having maybe one state in the United States having a big problem. For wheat though, it’s a different story. France produces more wheat than the United States altogether. Because of that, this is a bit of a problem for them. But as you move across Europe and you get toward Ukraine and into Russia and around that whole Black Sea area, the setup there isn’t nearly as poor. They’ll see some cool fronts moving through, they’ll see some rain at times. This is a Western Europe problem. But other than that, we don’t really have too many things to think about. Todd Gleason: We’ll check in with you again next week. Thank you. Mike Tannura: Sounds great, Todd. Todd Gleason: Mike Tannura is with Tstorm Weather online at tstorm.net. You’ve been listening to the Closing Market Report on this Thursday afternoon. It is the last trading day of the week. We’ll post our Commodity Week program up online tonight at willag.org, and then tomorrow during the Closing Market Report, we’ll have a special Juneteenth version of the CMR. And our Commodity Week program will air as usual on our home station in the second half hour, and on many of these radio stations over the weekend. I’m Extension’s Todd Gleason.