According to USDA, a private export sale of 198,000 metric tons of soybeans to unknown destinations was reported this morning. Wire sources indicated that on Friday China purchased an additional 10 cargoes of US soybeans for April–May shipment.

USDA Export Sales data shows that as of January 1, US soybean export sales commitments totaled 28.576 MMT, which is 29% lower than the same week of the 2024/25 marketing year. This represents 64% of the USDA export forecast and is behind the average sales pace of 82%. Actual shipments were 16.347 MMT, down 45% from last year. This is 37% of the USDA forecast and also lags the average shipping pace of 57%.

China’s state stockpiler Sinograin has announced an auction of 1.1 MMT of imported soybeans from the 2022–2025 period, scheduled for January 13.

Quarterly Grain Stocks data will be released on Monday. According to a Reuters survey of analysts, soybean stocks as of December 1 are expected to be 3.25 billion bushels, with estimates ranging from 2.95 to 3.445 billion bushels.

Commitment of Traders data showed that in the week ending January 6, speculative traders cut 26,845 contracts from their soybean net long position. As a result, the total net long position in futures and options stood at 57,717 contracts, the lowest level in the past 11 weeks.