Latest / Closing Market Report / Jun 23 | Closing Market Report
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- cmr260623 The June 23, 2026, edition of the Closing Market Report focuses on dairy production, trade policy, agronomic profitability, energy markets, and regional weather outlooks. Host Todd Gleason opens the program with Naomi Blohm of Total Farm Marketing to analyze the dairy sector and international trade. Blohm notes that the latest milk production report indicates a bearish trend, with May production rising 2.3% year-over-year, driving Class III milk prices below $16 despite robust domestic demand. The discussion transitions to the upcoming mandatory USMCA evaluation on July 1, highlighting market uncertainty regarding the United States' position, contrasted against efforts by Canada and Mexico to strengthen bilateral maritime trade routes. On crop production and management, the program highlights a multi-year data review presented by University of Illinois Extension agricultural economist Gary Schnitkey. The 11-year study reveals that increasing nitrogen application rates above the Maximum Return To Nitrogen (MRTN) baseline or adding extra tillage passes occasionally boosts yields but consistently fails to improve overall net profitability due to elevated input costs. Additionally, Extension weed scientist Aaron Hager previews the university's upcoming annual Weed Science Field Day, detailing its self-guided tour format designed for farmers and commercial applicators. In the agricultural energy segment, Kansas State University Extension economist Dan O'Brien reports stable domestic ethanol production, operating at approximately 89.3% of plant capacity across 201 active facilities. Plant profit margins remain steady between 11 and 15 cents per gallon, with eastern corn belt ethanol plants currently paying the highest cash corn prices in the nation. Turning to regional crop conditions, O'Brien characterizes the 2026 Kansas wheat harvest as exceptionally poor, citing near-record-low harvested-to-planted acreage ratios caused by severe storm and derecho damage. 00:42 Ag Markets with Naomi Blohm, Total Farm Marketing 07:42 High N-Rates and More Tillage Do Not Pay 10:54 USMCA Review Begins July 1 with an Uncertain Future 14:44 Ag Energies with Dan O'Brien, Kansas State Extension 19:58 Ag Weather with Don Day, Day Weather --- Todd Gleason: From the Land Grant university in Urbana-Champaign, Illinois, this is the Closing Market Report for the 23rd day of June, 2026. I’m Extension’s Todd Gleason. Coming up, I’ll talk about the commodity markets with Naomi Blohm. We’ll hear from Gary Schnitkey about tillage passes and nitrogen rates. We’ll discuss the USMCA—the review is coming up starting July 1. And then we’ll turn our attention to the agricultural energies with Dan O’Brien, and the weather with Don Day. All on this Tuesday edition of the Closing Market Report from Illinois Public Media, online on demand at WILLAg.org. announce: Todd Gleason’s services are made available to WILL by University of Illinois Extension. 00:42 Ag Markets with Naomi Blohm, Total Farm Marketing Todd Gleason: Naomi Blohm from totalfarmmarketing.com out of West Bend, Wisconsin now joins us. Hi Naomi, thank you for being with us again on this Tuesday. Naomi Blohm: Yeah, thanks for having me. Todd Gleason: You know, something that we don’t follow very well here, but because you’re in Wisconsin, I want to ask about: there was a milk report out, is that correct? What did it tell us? Naomi Blohm: Yes, yesterday afternoon’s milk production report came out and it has been bearish month after month after month. We have ample milk production in the country. On the report yesterday, it showed that milk production for the month of May was up 2.3% from a year ago. Now, for milk and milk production, anytime the number is a percent higher, that’s considered big. So, when it’s 2.3% higher, that is really a large increase in production. Not only are the cows doing a great job of producing milk, but we added 10,000 dairy cows to the herd. Since the end of December in the United States, the dairy herd has grown 99,000 head in five months. So, we have an abundance of milk, but thankfully demand is strong—demand for dairy products and the powder products for sure. Unfortunately, that has allowed nearby milk contract Class III prices to dip below $16, which is not great when it comes to milk pricing. That’s what’s happening on the dairy parlor, so to speak. Now, we do have a cold storage report coming out on Friday. We’ll see if that’s going to show us anything in terms of what cheese inventory and butter inventories have been. They had been on the lighter side because demand has been so strong, but we’ll see if that trend is continuing or not. Hopefully, we get some fresh demand news here sooner than later to help take up some of this abundance of milk production that we’ve seen. Keeping an eye on exports too, that’ll be a big one. Of course, we send a lot of our dairy exports not only overseas to Asia, but just across the borders into Canada and Mexico. Todd Gleason: Speaking of Canada and Mexico, the USMCA will start a review process—it’s mandatory after six years of being in play—July 1. Have you thought much about it and the uncertainty surrounding it as it’s related to its renewal, which would push it out another 16 years? Naomi Blohm: Yeah, and that actually is becoming such a factor that needs to be more on everyone’s radar. July 1st will be here before you know it. President Trump has said that he doesn’t necessarily think he needs to potentially sign it, but it would still of course be of benefit to all three countries if it happens. Of course, Mexico and Canada are huge trade partners for US agriculture and US produce. We send obviously so much corn to Mexico, ethanol to Canada, and dairy products going to both countries. We are sending pork over to Mexico. So it is an important document that, in my opinion, it would be helpful if we could just have it signed so we have the certainty. I think that was what your opening statement was—it’s the uncertainty that gets the market spooked. I recall, and I really think that when they were drafting this the last time, I think it was in 2020, Mexico started to turn towards Brazil for some short-term imports. Then even also when we were doing recent negotiations with tariffs, Mexico just kind of gave a little bit of a warning shot to remind us that they can buy grain from other countries as well, so we need to keep an eye on that. We’ll have a busy week with reports between the acreage report, quarterly stocks report, and then we’ll turn the calendar and we’ll have to see what becomes of the US, Mexico, Canada agreement and what President Trump decides to do. Todd Gleason: If I remember correctly, it was negotiated in 2019, and you are correct, Mexico did turn to Brazil. I recall that too, and then of course, put into place as you pointed out, I think in 2020. Other things we ought to discuss today: we’ve been following closely with the meteorologists, for instance, the heat in France and the issues that they might be suffering there. What impact might that have? Naomi Blohm: Yeah, so the heat wave in France is pretty significant. I looked on weather.com earlier today, like 105 degrees, and they’re not at all normally that hot. It’s not just in France; it lingers into other parts of Europe. But what I did go back and look at was just trying to remind myself how much corn does the European Union grow. They are expected to grow 57.5 million metric tons of corn this year, and they use everything that they grow, and they actually have to import over 19 million metric tons of corn. So I thought, well geepers, if this situation continues with that heat wave that’s going all across Europe, that might be a factor to where we see Europe have to import more corn. Hopefully, it would be US corn that they import. But if it is a bigger issue where they have a bigger drop in production, well then that of course would make the balance sheets a little bit different on the global ending stocks. For those kind of curious who are listening, France is the largest producer of corn in the European Union—they produce 13.3 million tons. Poland is the second largest producer, Romania, and then Hungary are the bottom of the top four there. So it’s something to watch, not just corn, it could be also with wheat. The El Niño pattern that’s going through right now is better for US weather, but it is spelling hot and dry conditions for Europe. Then we also need to keep an eye on what would happen with India—it can be hot and dry for India as well. As you know, India has the largest population on the planet now, and all of the food they grow they are using between wheat and rice and other grains and oilseeds, so weather always has to be watched. Todd Gleason: Hey, thank you much. We’ll talk with you again next week. Naomi Blohm: Thank you. Todd Gleason: You’re welcome. That’s Naomi Blohm, she is with Total Farm Marketing out of West Bend, Wisconsin, online at totalfarmmarketing.com. Our theme music here at the Closing Market Report is written, performed, produced, and courtesy of Logan County, Illinois farmer, Tim Gleason. 07:42 High N-Rates and More Tillage Do Not Pay announce: Chasing maximum corn yields could be costing farmers money. A review of over a decade’s worth of Midwestern farm data reveals that applying extra nitrogen and making additional tillage passes often fail to pay for themselves. 11 years of data collected from farm fields across the Midwest clearly shows two things: a farmer can occasionally increase corn yields by upping the nitrogen rate above the MRTN and doing an extra tillage pass, but they’ll lose money doing it, says Gary Schnitkey from the University of Illinois. Gary Schnitkey: And that is a message that we consistently find. If you do increase the N-rates above that MRTN, you sometimes—and that is a key, sometimes—increase yields, but you don’t increase profitability. And that makes sense; that N-rate calculator was built around profitability. announce: The N-rate calculator was developed by Land Grant universities. MRTN stands for Maximum Return To Nitrogen. It optimizes the total pounds of all nitrogen sources applied to a corn crop based on both the price of the nitrogen and the expected price of corn. Sticking with the MRTN and doing fewer tillage passes pays, says the farm doc team member, ag economist. Gary Schnitkey: If you do a tillage pass, you do have a higher yield than if you don’t do a tillage pass on average in our results, but it doesn’t cover the cost of doing the pass. So, you know, an emphasis on returns rather than yields is what we need to be seeing, particularly in this high-cost, low-price environment. announce: If you’d like to learn more, you may watch the “Farm Doc Practices That Pay” webinar on YouTube at youtube.com/atfarmdoc. You know tomorrow is the annual Weed Science Field Day right here on campus at the University of Illinois. Aaron Hager puts the program together. He says it is for farmers and retail applicators. Aaron Hager: It’s a self-guided tour. We’ll have signs in front of all the plots with the treatments on there. There’ll be a booklet that has all the experiments in there, so signs will be on the first replicate. But if somebody would like to see, well, how did that particular treatment perform in the second and third replicates, you can look that particular trial up in the field day book and then go look at the individual replications at your leisure. announce: Aaron Hager is an extension weed scientist at the University of Illinois. The annual Weed Science Field Day is on campus tomorrow. You can find all the details on our website. Look for the article in the list of articles—it should be the first one there or one of the very first ones—and it’ll tell you how to arrive, what time (it’s early in the morning), and that you need to bring a $10 bill with you. 10:54 USMCA Review Begins July 1 with an Uncertain Future announce: The United States, Mexico, Canada trade agreement, or USMCA, is set to undergo a mandatory review starting July 1. Two of the three USMCA nations, Mexico and Canada, have said they’d like it to continue. However, US President Donald Trump is not so sure, and said so when speaking to reporters at the June G7 meeting in France. Donald Trump: I would rather leave it unsigned, I’d rather have it terminated. announce: Although Mr. Trump in the same back and forth said he would probably sign it, he also said he views it as expiring immediately. Donald Trump: I would prefer not having an agreement, but I’m open to doing it, we’ll see what happens. announce: So as of now, just going to stick around for 10 years, you’re okay with that? Donald Trump: No, it’s not sticking around, it’ll be terminated. announce: In other words, after a decade? Donald Trump: It expires. announce: Yeah, yeah, in a decade? Donald Trump: It expires. Yeah. I prefer that. I view it as possibly expiring immediately. announce: That’s all fairly confusing, but mostly accurate as the terms of the original USMCA were laid out. It sets forth the six-year review starting July 1, the 10-year sunset clause should the parties be unable to come to an agreement upon the review, and a final clause that would allow any of the three nations to exit or terminate their portion of the agreement, but for the other two parties to continue on. As it happens, Mexico and Canada have been planning for that possibility, says the president of Mexico, Claudia Sheinbaum, in a response to a reporter. She says the two have been strengthening their relationship and even building a new route which bypasses the United States. Sheinbaum says Canada has been investing in a Mexican port that would allow for more maritime trade. Claudia Sheinbaum: [Spanish audio] So, we are strengthening the relation between Mexico and Canada, and additionally, evidently both countries want the trade agreement to be maintained. announce: The president of Mexico goes on to discuss how USMCA was ratified by the congresses in each of the three nations and is therefore law. On that point, the US Senate Finance Committee maintains it is unclear if President Trump has the legal authority to terminate the trade agreement using the six-month out clause without the agreement of the United States Congress. Now for his part, the Prime Minister of Canada, Mark Carney, believes the cross-border USMCA integrations to be good, but says because the ambitions of the US President have changed, the review process is already under pressure. Mark Carney: I mean what we’re seeing right now is that we have an agreement, we have that integration, tariffs are being put up in a series of areas that are violations of the agreement—I’ve called a spade a spade, might as well. So there’s a question about whether that alignment is still there. Can we really rely ultimately on what’s written in the agreement, what’s in a dispute settlement mechanism? And that’s a very different environment than was there previously. announce: President Trump negotiated the USMCA in his first term but has since become more US-centric in his trade stance. The Cato Institute, a free-market think tank in Washington, D.C., in a June 1 article concludes President Trump’s refusal to extend that agreement is not its death knell, but it’s also far from harmless. Since USMCA went into force, Mexico and Canada individually have surpassed China as the number one and two trade partners of the United States. The automotive and agricultural sectors are particularly interwoven across all three economies. 14:44 Ag Energies with Dan O’Brien, Kansas State Extension Todd Gleason: It’s time now to take a look at the agricultural energies. Dan O’Brien is here. He’s with Kansas State University Extension and an agricultural economist. Hi Dan. Tell me about ethanol trade across the planet and domestic usage in the last month or so. Dan O’Brien: Well, I think following the trend we’d seen signaled by the USDA in that June 11th WASDE report, where they had lowered the amount of corn usage for ethanol by about 25 million bushels down to 5.575 billion, we’re seeing generally level usage of ethanol during a time when if we’re going to have strong usage seasonally, this would be it. So we’re holding steady in terms of ethanol usage. In the bigger picture, we’re still on line to produce about 16.5 billion gallons of ethanol at plant capacity. At least, you know, at least when you look at these numbers, you hope you’re seeing the actual figures that come out of that, because ethanol plants have been known to go beyond capacity. But anyway, it looks like we’re producing at about 89.3% of plant capacity—201 ethanol plants, 18.5 billion gallons capacity, and as I mentioned, about 16.5 billion gallons of actual production, so moving pretty steadily along. We’ve certainly seen changes in the prices for corn that are paid at ethanol plants. As of June 23rd, today as we speak, the average price in Illinois for corn at an ethanol plant is $4.16 or $4.17, with a range of just over $4, about $4.02 up to $4.38. Compare that—and that is certainly right in the heart of the central eastern corn belt—out here in the western corn belt, we’re a little bit higher: $4.19 and a half to $4.41 and a half, and an overall average price of $4.27. What’s odd about that, as I’ve been watching that anyway, is that Kansas had been lagging quite a bit—10 to 20 cents or more of what Illinois, Indiana, and the eastern corn belt were paying for corn at the plants, but now we’ve seen that flip back. Indiana still stands strong for corn price at the plants at $4.38, Ohio $4.50, so I guess as you go farther out into the eastern corn belt and the situations that they face, both in terms of ethanol markets and corn supply, they actually have the highest corn prices paid at ethanol plants of any place in the country. Todd Gleason: I suppose though the bottom line is: are the ethanol plants profitable in cents per gallon? Dan O’Brien: Still showing about 11 to about 15 cents a gallon. With that, we keep going forward, and we really haven’t seen a prolonged period of calculated losses in ethanol plants since back during the November 2024 through May 2025 period. We’ve generally been showing profitability, and for an industry like that, that brings stability and perhaps even some growth. Todd Gleason: Finally, before I let you go, what are crop conditions like across the state of Kansas? Dan O’Brien: The 2026 wheat harvest in Kansas is generally very poor—near record low harvested-to-planted acres percentage. So that’s indicative of a lot of wheat that failed, or in some of that, you’ve got double crop that’s already happened going into that, and you can see it as you drive up and down the road. I think we’ve just had major storms really all throughout the state, but especially in the west, our version of a derecho, or dereco, however the correct pronunciation is of that. As you and I were talking before we came on the air, the market overall will ignore that, but it does cause a fair amount of crop damage. In general, they think, well, the rainfall outdoes the localized crop damage, in general. But maybe the best thing to say is it’s a busy time of year for the crop insurance people in a fair amount of Kansas, just because of all the storms that have happened and the adjustments and anticipation of yield damage that has occurred. Todd Gleason: Hey, thank you much. That of course is Dan O’Brien. He is with Kansas State University Extension and an agricultural economist, joining us on this Tuesday edition of the Closing Market Report. It comes to you from Illinois Public Media. You can find and listen to our programming anytime you’d like at WILLAg.org. 19:58 Ag Weather with Don Day, Day Weather Todd Gleason: Let’s turn our attention to the weather forecast now. Don Day is here. He is with Day Weather in Cheyenne, Wyoming. Hello Don. I hope you are doing as well as I am on this beautiful summer day. Don Day: Yeah, it is a beautiful summer day. Temperatures are pretty comfortable and it’s just nice to have summer start this way. Todd Gleason: Well, it’s great to have summer start this way, a little cool for crop conditions. Can you tell me where in the large part of the corn belt we actually stand as it relates to temperatures, probably moisture as well, and then what conditions might look like going forward? Don Day: Well, what we can see is still for the rest of this week some coolness. We’re still going to see temperatures averaging a bit below average, really from everywhere from the east slopes of the Rockies into the Midwest and the Great Lakes. But there’s a bit of a change coming as we get into, well really the middle to the end of the weekend and early next week, to where we’re going to see the cool weather reverse. The warm weather has been out west. The western part of the US is going to see a pretty big cooldown—in fact cold enough, believe it or not, that this weekend there’ll be snow falling in the high mountains of Montana, Idaho, and Wyoming. That cooler weather will push warmer air from the deserts into the Midwest and corn belt, so we’re going to see right at the end of the month and into early July some of that heat maybe folks have been waiting for to get some growing degree days accumulated, and that’s going to take us well into the first week of July. Todd Gleason: Will that warm air spawn one of two things: either more thunderstorms, and or because it’s dry, maybe just humidity coming up out of the soils here? Don Day: Initially, initially, I don’t see a lot of precipitation in this warmer pattern developing for the last couple of days of June and into early July. It does look like it is going to be a pattern where the better moisture will stay north and west. I think later on, as we get into let’s say the second and third week of July, we’ll start to see that moisture tap from the southwest start to find itself moving in, but there is definitely a warmer and drier period that’s coming. Todd Gleason: Hey, thanks much, we’ll talk with you again soon enough. Don Day: Sounds good. Todd Gleason: Don Day is with Day Weather, he is in Cheyenne, Wyoming, joining us on this Tuesday edition of the Closing Market Report again. Do visit our website at WILLAg.org if you’re thinking of joining us tomorrow morning for the Weed Science Field Day—you can find all the details there, they’re in the article about the Weed Science Field Day. You do want to bring a $10 bill with you for your lunch. However, it is a fantastic day and a great day for any of you that are concerned about herbicides and their effectiveness across your own fields. Check it out at WILLAg.org and join Aaron Hager and company tomorrow morning on campus in Urbana. I’m University of Illinois Extension’s Todd Gleason.