Argentina crushers buy more US soybean cargoes, seek 1m mt

Buyers in Argentina have purchased two more cargoes of US soybeans, according to USDA data released Wednesday, making a total of four so far this week amid reports that crushers are seeking to source 1 million mt.

The 120,000-mt sale is for the 2018/19 harvest and follows Tuesday’s announcement for the same volume.

“The sharp fall in domestic production and the consequent increase in the idle capacity of the industry has encouraged US soybean imports,” said Eugenio Irazuegui, an analyst with Argentina-based brokerage Zeni.

While the USDA does not give delivery or price details, sources said the first cargoes bought Monday were likely to be booked for October or November loading and that the buyer was Vicentin.

Vicentin could not be reached for comment.

Typically, Argentina imports soybeans from Paraguay and Bolivia to top up domestic production.

However, an expected 30% fall in production to 40 million mt or below, coupled with the possibility of China taxing US imports of soybeans, has forced South American soybean prices higher and sent Argentinian crushers scrambling to source supply of non-South American beans.

“The crushers are afraid that they won’t have enough beans to process in the second half of the year... [so] they are buying US beans as they are cheaper than Brazilian," said Micheala Kuhl, commodity analyst at Commerzbank.