Yesterday’s rain did not bring the expected relief; but only scattered showers in Mackena and surroundings, these rains of 10 to 20 mm in this specific area will only allow digging from these fields. There is a growing concern in all other affected areas by consistent drought due to lack of suitable digging conditions. Not only soil needs to be loosen up, but also peanut plants need to be rehydrated. We hope that the next forecasted storms coming weekend will help ultimately… to be continued…

USA current crop firming up; farmers are not willing to sell the farmerstock as cheap as USD 400,00 anymore; the last 2 weeks USA medium and jumbo runner market jumped USD 150,00 per ton; this situation isn't related to the Argentine drought but due to domestic prices fluctuation from other commodities such as cotton; to be continued...

Coming back on our previous crop estimates, it seems that the plenty of rainfall during the last 60 days has favored yields and hectares plantations (to be verified). This week the National Crop Estimate committee announced a total peanut crop of 89,000 MT, witch a too optimistic figure that indicates an average yield of 1.58 MT/HA. Local expert opinion is more that the average yield will be between 1.1 – 1.3 MT/Ha, which will bring the South African Spanish crop to a total production of 61,000 – 73,000 metric tons of farmer stock kernel basis. We advise to be cautious as a substantial part of the crop has been planted very late and thus exposed to potential issues during a late harvest, to be continued…

Still no rains, after last week scattered showers; giving many disparity in field quality throughout the 'Cordoba Peanut Belt' very bullish today!

After the few showers that happened last week end; 10mm in the north and 15-20mm around Rio Cuarto. Latest rain covered only 30% of the peanut fields. Bulk of the crop is still under light stress. Below report from our local experts: Several weeks have been passed without a decent rain in the peanut area.  All rain activities so far have been scattered showers, except for few exceptions, that provided limited or no rainfall. Weather forecast expect same pattern for another week , scattered showers with limited rainfall. By the 6/7th of March there is a possibility of decent rains but again not covering all areas. The crop in the Centre to South Peanut Belt has deteriorated. Peanuts that have been planted in October have no time now to get a decent recovery. Potential Yields At this stage is fair to expect that 2018 crop yields (average)will not be much above 2600 kgs. If we compare it with 3600 kgs of harvested area last year, you can see that production will fall, despite the planting increase of 5%. Production estimation at this stage: 2018 crop tonnage will be around 1.0 M(in shell basis) providing normal weather happens from early March till harvesting is completed. The next 2 weeks weather pattern will be crucial for the crop…

Current crop 2017 market, reached bottom we believe, pricing depending on the quality level; substantial differential between grade A and grade B, fear of mold, AFLA and high FFA. New crop 2018 is looking good until now, market fears effects of drought from La NIna climatic influence. To follow carefully; in our view market has reach bottom : USD 1'400 for blanched 40/50 2018 crop

European market: very quiet January and February 2018 , warehouses seem quite full for the time of the year, a very cold February month could trigger some activity, starting with very active birdfood market pushing spot prices slightly upwards; we expect much more activity on the physical market as from March/April 2018 : mixed

Still very quiet, suffering local demand, oversupply, Chinese New Year, weak market in general, bearish.

South Africa: following our latest report (2months ago) due to the drought during November and December 2017, planting intentions have been slashed by 40%, from 60.000 hectares down to 36.000 hectares; if everything goes well until the harvesting (May, June 2018) we could reach a total crop production of around 50.000 metric tons; which size will leave rooms for imports as from July-August 2018.

West Africa: Senegal and Guinea Bissau: weak market mostly due to bumper crops from 1,5 MIO+ in Senegal and 400’000 tons in Guinea Bissau, traditional buyers are the Chinese which unfortunately are not very active for the time being due to the weak Asian peanut and edible oil market. Bearish