By Ryan Hanrahan
Reuters’ Ella Cao and Naveen Thukral reported that “China’s state-owned COFCO bought three U.S. soybean cargoes, two trade sources said, the country’s first purchases from this year’s U.S. harvest, shortly before a summit of leaders Donald Trump and Xi Jinping.”
“As the two nations battle over trade tariffs, the lack of Chinese buying has cost U.S. farmers billions of dollars in lost sales, after they largely supported Trump in his campaigns for president,” Cao and Thukral reported. “Although COFCO’s deal for December-January shipment of about 180,000 metric tons of soybeans was China’s first such buy in months, traders do not expect a significant resumption in demand for U.S. cargoes after recent large South American purchases.”
“‘COFCO has proceeded to purchase U.S. beans even before the two leaders have reached a trade agreement,’ said a trader at an international trading company that supplies Chinese crushers,” Cao and Thukral reported. “‘The volumes booked by COFCO are not that large, three cargoes for now.'”