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Chicago soybean futures slid for a second straight session on Thursday, although easing trade tensions between Washington and Beijing kept a floor under the market. Wheat lost ground after climbing for the last four sessions to a near one-week top while corn dropped, having risen for the last two days. The most-active soybean contract on the Chicago Board Of Trade fell 0.1 percent to $9.15-3/4 a bushel by 0341 GMT, having closed down by a similar level on Wednesday. Wheat was down 0.3 percent at $5.20-3/4 a bushel, having gained ...

Some call them safeguards, some call them protectionist barriers, and some love them and some hate them. Few measures divide like import tariffs. We have seen it in the U.S. While Europe would claim its own measures are a reaction to the impact of imports following the U.S. Section 232 action, the reality is domestic European producers — led by their trade group, the European Steel Association (EUROFER) — are very much in favor of the European Union’s decision to put in place permanent safeguard measures on steel imports (in ...

Was it another false dawn for the nickel market? Last week’s rally to a five-month high of $13,350 per tonne on the London Metal Exchange has gone into sharp reverse. Nickel was trading back at $12,385 on Tuesday. The trigger for the price surge was concern that Brazilian producer Vale’s nickel operations would suffer some sort of knock-on effect from the devastating tailings collapse at the company’s Brumadinho iron ore mine. Such fears have proved unfounded. So far. There may still be ramifications for Vale’s Onca Puma ferronickel operations in ...

The political crisis in Venezuela risks disrupting global crude markets as the type of oil pumped by the OPEC member becomes increasingly scarce, according to the International Energy Agency. The U.S., Venezuela’s biggest customer, is banning oil imports from the country as it condemns President Nicolas Maduro for fraudulently clinging to power after disputed elections. Venezuela’s output is already at the lowest in decades as a spiraling economic crisis takes its toll on oil infrastructure. While global markets remain comfortably supplied, disruption in Venezuela poses a threat because production of ...

Scared by looming U.S. anti-cartel legislation for the oil industry, the Organization for the Petroleum Exporting Countries and its allies such as Russia have decided against creating a formal body, at least on paper. A draft of a document – setting up a new alliance and dated January 2019 – and seen by Reuters carefully avoids any mention of sensitive issues such as oil prices, market share and production cuts. OPEC and Russia have been cutting production together to support prices since 2017, after clinching a deal in December 2016, ...

The European Union reached a provisional deal on new rules governing import gas pipelines including Russia’s planned Nord Stream 2, in a move that cast doubts over the project’s current operating structure. Adding to uncertainty is Denmark’s potential ban of the pipeline’s planned route through its territorial waters and threats by the United States to sanction it if it goes ahead. The draft law calls for all import pipelines to meet EU energy market rules by not being directly owned by gas suppliers, applying non-discriminatory tariffs and transparent reporting and ...

Optimism about U.S.-China trade talks and bumper earnings lifted European shares to a three-month high on Thursday, though news that Germany only dodged recession by the narrowest of margins left the euro feeling unloved. Markets were generally in a cautious mood as investors hung on for any hint of progress in the tariff talks amid reports the White House could extend the deadline for a deal. Stocks extended gains regardless. Strong results from Nestle, drugmaker AstraZeneca and plane giant Airbus lifted the pan-European STOXX 600 0.4 percent and towards its ...

China’s economic development gap is widening with tougher times looming after more than half of its provinces missed their economic growth targets last year and the effects of the trade war with the US taking a toll on the domestic economy. Seventeen of 31 Chinese provincial-level divisions failed to meet their gross domestic product (GDP) growth rate goals in a year where the national economy expanded at 6.6 per cent, its slowest pace in 28 years, according to a review of local annual economic reports by the South China Morning ...

EU lawmakers approved the start of a free trade agreement with Singapore, reflecting the EU’s deeper push for open market accords with higher-growth Asian countries. About two-thirds of the European Parliament’s members voted in favour of the free trade accord, which could be launched in a few months, as well as a related agreement on how to settle disputes between foreign investors and states. The pact has been nine years in the making. Negotiations ended in 2014, but as protests mounted against other trade accords – notably one planned with ...

Britain’s banks say they are getting no guidance from government on how to deal with a predicted surge in business casualties in a “no deal” Brexit. The banks have asked the government to engage with them on a range of requests, ranging from specific financial support for businesses hit by supply chain problems or delayed payments to guidance on how to lend to those in financial trouble, but this has fallen on deaf ears, two senior bankers from two of Britain’s major banks told Reuters. The lack of action, despite ...

Bank mergers are getting speedier under President Trump, with federal regulators changing policies that had deterred deals after the financial crisis. That stance could potentially help fuel more consolidation, though it has also raised concerns that regulators aren’t scrutinizing mergers closely enough. Last week, BB&T Corp. and SunTrust Banks Inc. announced plans for a $28.2 billion all-stock deal that, if completed, would be the biggest bank merger since the crisis. The number of bank mergers approved hasn’t changed significantly in the past two years. But the process for getting a ...

The market came alive today as mills and traders dived in to pick up material. Traders who have little stock at hand say they are relatively bullish,

The protective membranes of the water catchment system on the Paraopeba River are installed and functioning correctly.

BP Chief economist Spencer Dale discusses the findings of the 2019 edition of the Energy Outlook. Source: BP

Daily rates on main tanker routes as compiled by shipbroker Charles R. Weber.