News

Economists call USDA’s corn stocks estimate a “huge bullish surprise”

Ag economists are surprised by USDA’s latest grain stocks, yield and usage estimates for corn.

Scott Irwin with the University of Illinois says for the first time he can remember, the USDA revised their September 1st stocks number for corn making the  December 1st corn stocks estimate of 11.38 billion bushels a more than 400 million bushel usage surprise. 

“This is, at least on the surface, one of the largest bullish grain stocks surprises that we have ever seen.”         

He says another shock when looking at the USDA numbers, is that first quarter feed and residual use for corn is implied to be over 2.6 billion bushels.

“It’s the largest first quarter feed and residual estimate since the beginning of the ethanol era.”

Fellow economist Todd Hubbs says the increase in yield estimates from November for eastern corn belt states (IL, IN, OH in this case) are also questionable, as well as the nearly 200 bushels per acre statewide yield average for Iowa.

Scott Irwin and Todd Hubbs during a farmdoc webinar

Add Comment

Your email address will not be published.


 

Stay Up to Date

Subscribe for our newsletter today and receive relevant news straight to your inbox!