Todd Gleason: From the Land Grant University at Urbana Champaign, Illinois, this is the closing market report. It is the February 2026. I'm extension's Todd Gleason. Coming up, we'll talk about the commodity market with Matt Bennett of agmarket.net. Matt, by the way, will be at the AllDAG Outlook this year.

Be sure to get your tickets right now. You can order them online at willag.org. The cost is just $40. The AllDAG is on Tuesday, March 3. Also coming up today, we'll take a look at USDA's ag forum numbers released this morning and the farm doc January projections for crop budgets.

The two combined tell a not great story for 2026. And then as we wrap up our time together, we'll turn our attention to the weather forecast with Mike Tanura all on this Thursday edition of the closing market report from Illinois public medium. It is public radio for the farming world online on demand at willag.org willag.org. Todd Gleason services are made available to WILL by University of Illinois Extension. March corn for the day settled at $4.25 and 3 quarters.

That was down a penny in a quarter. The May at $4.36 and a quarter, a half lower, and December futures up a half. That settlement price at $4.61 and a half. The March soybeans, $11.41, 7 and a half cents higher. May up seven at $11.56, and November soybeans, a penny and three quarters higher.

They settled at $11.18 and a quarter. Bean meal futures, 90¢ higher. The bean oil, a dollar 9¢ higher. Weed soft bread, up 12 and a half cents at $5.63 and 3 quarters in the March. The hard bread, a 14 and a half higher at $5.65 and a half cents.

Live cattle futures in Chicago, 90¢ higher. The feeders down 30¢, and lean hogs up 90¢. Crude oil, a dollar 34 higher per gallon at $66.39. Diesel fuel trading $2.50 and 6 tenths of a cent, up seven and six tenths of a cent, and gasoline on the ARBOB up three and eight tenths of a cent per gallon at $2.24 and 3 tenths of a cent. The Dow Jones Industrial Average now at forty nine thousand four thirty three off 289 points, and the S and P 500 down 22.

Here to talk about these numbers is Kurt Kimmel. He is from agmarket.net. Thanks for filling in for Matt Bennett this afternoon on short notice. Kurt, can you tell me about the marketplace, and how it reacted at all to this morning's USDA AgForm outlook numbers? Those were released at 6AM.

Curt Kimmel: Giddy up. You're the horse, the fire horse. So, yes, bring it on here. You heard it here first a couple weeks ago. But anyway, to your question, corn acreage, basically 94.

I think the average trade guess was 94.9. When you look at the overall supply demand balance sheet expectations they put out, ending stocks 1.8. Was that type of estimate you would have thought corn been up at six a. M. That was released, and, unfortunately, I think the trade felt that was built in as far as maybe old numbers, realization that the acreage could be a little higher than that.

So, that's in the marketplace now. I think probably the focus now is actual, plantings and the plains intentions report, as we move forward. Soybean number 85,000,000 acres, the average trade guess is 84.9. And, when you look at the more bean acres, it's probably going be less, than that from the point that, it's probably a little bit on the on the high side. The thing on the beans is the carryout is about three fifty five versus three fifty this current crop year, so overall, carryout's the same, but the thing that kind of stuck out, exports 1,700,000,000 bushels, so they're anticipating, some decent, exports, down the road here.

But these were estimates, number crunchers put that together some time ago, that's out, it's pretty well, dialed in. I think now the focus as we move forward here is how large that South American crop is and how soon that South American crop, comes online here because that's our main competition here, until we get into the growing season here in The US.

Todd Gleason: Just a couple of other numbers, and these probably will show up in the first official estimates for the new crop, which will come out in the May WASDE, or World Agricultural Supply and Demand estimate. The acreage numbers again for wheat, 45,000,000, for corn, 94,000,000, soybeans, 85,000,000. The corn and soybeans will be updated with the prospective plantings report at the end of the month. The number that will likely just be rolled into the WASDE figures in May for corn and soybeans is the, number that they're using for yield. That's a 183 bushels to the acre for corn and 53 bushels to the acre for soybeans.

Now I do wanna talk about the soybean market. Why did it catch fire at some point during the day? Then fires, you know, not much, but it's still finished up in the nearbys.

Curt Kimmel: Yeah. The soybean market just continues to climb the wall of worry. The thing about the bean market is a lot of the beads have been sold. A lot of beads were sold last fall. A lot has been moved out.

The producer continues to reward the market a little bit here on this rally. The main focus is the soybean oil. We're seeing soybean oil quickly approach and test the $0.60 pound level. Ideas that as we start to see the expectations released on bio renewable 45Z that there's going to be some hopefully some stability in the future of bean oil demand. Crush, another record crush here as far as big, 21,000,000 bushels being crushed during the month of January, so crush still, stays fairly active.

But on the flip side, when you look at bean oil stocks, 1,900,000 pounds, that's quite a few, bean oil stocks around, so we're going to actually have to see some legislation come through here to support the usage and also continue to see this plants come online being profitable. But overall the bean market just continues to hang in there. These March beans, close today 11.41. I wouldn't be surprised if we can't skew another, fifteen to twenty cents higher here and kinda see what develops in.

Todd Gleason: And finally, before I let you go, again, thank you for filling in for Matt. And also thank you to Matt and yourself who will be at the All Day Ag Outlook coming up on Tuesday, March 3 at the Beef House. I appreciate that greatly. I know you look to forward to it each and every year.

Curt Kimmel: Oh, boy. It's always an exciting event. Go there and be able to visit with everybody and also share ideas. It seems like just about every presenter there has, something to contribute that everyone can use.

Todd Gleason: Absolutely. That is, of course, Kurt Kimmel. He is with agmarket.net. He and his colleague, Matt Bennett, will be at the All Ag Outlook at the Beef House. That's Tuesday, March 3.

You can too, but you have to buy your tickets. You can do that now at willag.org. That's willag.org. Many of the on air analysts from WILL, the PharmDoc team, and Eric Snodgrass will be there for the event this year. Just one Agnews story for the day invoking the Defense Production Act.

President Donald Trump, Wednesday, designated glyphosate based herbicides and elemental phosphorus as critical to national defense and ordered agriculture secretary Brooke Rollins to prioritize and secure domestic supplies. The order also grants legal immunity to domestic producers that comply with federal directives and gives USDA authority to direct production and control distribution if necessary. Citing the Defense Production Act, Trump declared phosphorus and glyphosate products are essential not only for agriculture, but also for military readiness as well. The threat of scarcity of either phosphorus or glyphosate would leave The US vulnerable, he says. At USDA, Rollins will consult with defense secretary DTEGSETH and work to determine the proper nationwide priorities and allocations of all materials, services, and facilities necessary to ensure a continued and adequate supply of elemental phosphorus and glyphosate based herbicides.

And that's a quick look at today's Ag News. You're listening to the Closing Market Report from Illinois Public Media. Our theme music is written, performed, produced by Logan County, Illinois farmer, Tim Gleason. Given the release of USDA's Ag Outlook Forum acreage and production figures that we've already talked about today, I thought it might be interesting now to take a look at the January crop budgets the FarmDoc team produced. We'll start with corn.

Here's Nick Paulson.

Nick Paulson: On the revenue side, we are currently projecting a $4.25 per bushel corn price for the 2026 crop and assuming trend yield levels across Illinois. Trend yield expectations range from a high of two forty one bushels per acre on high productivity farmland in Central Illinois to a low of 198 bushels per acre in Southern Illinois. In addition to crop revenue, our budgets include sizable projected federal payments from the ARC and PLC commodity programs ranging from $48 to $58 per acre. Total projected revenues for corn production in 2026 range from $890 per acre in Southern Illinois to $10.80 dollars per acre in Central Illinois.

Todd Gleason: The FarmDoc team divides production cost into nonland and land cost categories. Now subcategories of nonland cost include direct inputs, power cost, and overhead cost. Direct costs include major inputs like fertilizers, pesticides, and seed, as well as the costs associated with drying and storage and crop insurance. Power costs include those associated with the farm's machinery and light vehicles. There are costs too, like hired labor, building costs, insurance, interest expense on non real estate loans and others.

FarmDoc puts a range on the land cost, but cash rent, at $182 in Southern Illinois per acre and $327 in Central Illinois. And that leads us to the returns. Again, here's Nick Paulson.

Nick Paulson: Returns for corn production in 2026 are projected to be negative across all regions, ranging from negative $82 per acre on in Southern Illinois to negative $38 per acre in Northern Illinois.

Todd Gleason: Let's turn now to the soybean budgets for 2026. The Farm Doc team is using a $10.40 per bushel cash price and expected trend yields to range from 61 bushels per acre in Southern Illinois to 76 bushels per acre on highly productive soil in Central Illinois. Adding in the expected ARC and PLC payments results in revenue projections ranging from $682 an acre in the South to $846 per acre in their center part of the state.

Nick Paulson: For 2026, we are projecting the lowest nonland cost for soybeans in Northern Illinois at $476 per acre, and the highest nonland cost for soybeans in Southern Illinois at just over $500 per acre. Projected farmer returns to soybean production in 2026 are expected to be higher than those for corn. Returns are just above breakeven levels at $17 per acre in Northern Illinois, dollars 6 per acre on lower productivity land in Central Illinois and $25 per acre for high productivity farmland in Central Illinois. Projected soybean returns in Southern Illinois are just below breakeven at negative $5 per acre.

Todd Gleason: So here's the bottom line. For a fiftyfifty corn soybean rotation, average net returns across all regions of Illinois, will be negative for the current crop year or 2026. For example, highly productive soils in Central Illinois are projected to generate a negative return of $15 an acre. Those projections for 2026 now continue what has been a four year run of poor returns for corn soybean rotation. Returns averaged negative $46 an acre in 2023 and minus $41 an acre in 2024.

That despite large government payments. And in Central Illinois, returns are currently expected to be marginally positive for 2025 due to the payments from commodity programs and the farmer bridge assistance program, which exceed all toll $90 an acre. Now I know this is bad news, and it doesn't make you want to spend any more money. But I'm asking you to spend today $40 to come see us at the beef house for the All Day Ag Outlook. This is the 30 sixth annual event, and I hope that during that event, you'll be able to pick up some ideas on how maybe to help out the bottom line for your farm.

A lot of what we'll do that day is very normal. We'll talk about the weather. We'll have grain outlooks. We'll do some fundamentals. We'll also talk about production and budgeting.

We'll discuss the kinds of things that you might need to know as it's related to the value of farmland, and we'll take up crop insurance, How best to use it to make sure that you get the most out of every crop you put into the ground for the cheapest possible price. So I think it's worthwhile. I really do. Who will be there? Eric Snodgrass, Joe Jansen, Joanna Colucci.

We'll also have along with us Gary Schnitke and Mike Suslow, Alan Dearden, Greg Johnson, Chip Nellinger, Kurt Kimmel, and Matt Bennett, along with Nick Paulson and Bruce Sherrick. It's a fantastic day. It's only $40. It's the best $40 you will spend this year. Plus, you'll get the beef house meal at the noon, coffee and rolls in the morning, and we'll have a good time.

I promise we always do. Come see us. Buy your ticket today. The cost is $40 online at willag.org. Let's turn our attention to the global growing regions and the weather that has been taking place and might yet come.

We're now joined by Mike Tenure. He is the president and CEO at t storm weather in Naperville, Illinois. You can find him online at tstorm.net. Hi, Mike. Thanks for being with us.

We've got a lot to cover today. Let's take them by nation, I think. We'll begin in South America. Start with Argentina. What are conditions like on the ground?

Mike Tannura: Well, they had some great thunderstorms overnight in the central region. That includes around one third of their corn and soybean crop. So that area saw one to three inches of rain overnight, and the soil moisture there has stabilized. And that was on top of some rain that happened earlier in the week and last weekend. So overall, things in part of Argentina are looking better.

In the southern part of Argentina, it's kind of a mixed bag. A lot of Buenos Aires missed out on some of these storms, and because of that, they still need more rain. As we move forward through this weekend and into next week, there's not very much more rain on the horizon. The main event was over the last twelve hours and that cluster is now moving off to the north, and there's only going to be a few behind it. The other thing that's a little bit tricky with Argentina is that we do need some of these rains in the southern areas, but it also was very hot yesterday.

High temperatures topped out at over a 105 degrees in the north, and that's a key lake corn region. So overall, kind of a mixed bag here in Argentina, Todd, where we had some nice rains recently, but there's not a whole lot coming up, We've seen some heat at the same time.

Todd Gleason: Let's work our way from south to north in Brazil. What are the southern areas like?

Mike Tannura: Well, they also need some rain. They've been drying out over the last thirty to forty five days, but it's a little bit tricky there because if you look at Rio Grande do Sul, that's where the story is the cleanest. This area benefits from rain at this time of the year, so if we could get some more it would be nice for them. In Parana, which is another key state, they plant a lot earlier and they harvest a lot earlier with some of that underway now. And so the dry weather is not necessarily a real bad thing because it helps you to get the crop harvested.

So kind of a mixed story there. We do have some storms on the way over the next five days, but it doesn't look to be too heavy. So while that will benefit Parana where harvesting is taking place, we would like to see a few more Rio Grande Do Sul, but overall, another mixed bag kind of story.

Todd Gleason: And if you move into the Center West, does the story change much?

Mike Tannura: Well, the forecast is a lot cleaner up there. There's a lot of rain on the way. We have a number of cool fronts that are going to start to move northward over the next five days, That will initiate a very stormy period for Central And Northern Brazil. Now that area is harvesting soybeans and also planting corn. Big rains at this time of the year are not very ideal, But you need to keep in mind that February is the stormiest month of the year.

We're looking for four and a half to seven inches of rain over the next two weeks, and around four inches is normal. So even though that is a lot of rain, it's not totally unusual for this time of the year. But overall, we would not expect to see rapid planting or harvesting taking place over the next two weeks.

Todd Gleason: How would you categorize then across the whole of the continent, you may need to do this by segment, the growing season weather so far and its effect on the crops.

Mike Tannura: Well, overall in Brazil, I think the story has been that it's been pretty much normal or even a little bit better than normal. The main problems have been with some dryness in the North and South at different times of the year, but they were preceded or followed by some nice rains. So we don't really have any major concerns there. And in some areas, they've had some pretty fantastic rains. So that's why this season probably will end up being a normal one or even a better than normal one.

In Argentina, it's a little bit trickier because they've been going through some dry periods, some hot periods, some wet periods. But overall, they've pretty much been in a low end drought over the last two to three months. They've never been completely dry like we saw in the drought in 2018 or 2023, but it also hasn't been real wet like we've seen in some other seasons. So in Argentina, it's probably been slightly worse than average season for them with rain still important over the next three to four weeks. But at this point in time, it's hard to believe they're going have a bumper crop.

Todd Gleason: Now on that note, as we move through the winter months in the Northern Hemisphere towards meteorological spring at the first of March, with each passing day, I'm wondering what the significance of the drought that remains in place might be across much of the Midwest.

Mike Tannura: Well, it's certainly something that you have to watch. If you recall last summer, we had some pretty fantastic rains from June through July, and then all of a sudden they shut down in August. And they've pretty much stayed shut down ever since then. Yes, we've seen some pretty nice winter storms here and there and we've seen some okay rains in different areas. But if you look at rainfall over the last 180, it's been very dry across the whole of the Corn Belt and including parts of the Plains and the Mid South.

In fact, if you look at soft red winter wheat, which is mainly grown in the Eastern Corn Belt and in the Mid South, The coverage of dryness based on rainfall over the last hundred and eighty days is by far the highest in more than twelve years of record for this time of the year or really for any point in the growing season. So this is potentially a major drought that we're in. Now the key word there is potentially, if we get some nice rains in March or April or even June or July for corn and soybeans, then this really doesn't matter all that much. But we talked about this last week and that every drought has to start somewhere. And this is how some of the bigger droughts have started in the past.

But there's also examples of where it looked like this at this time of the year and then everything turned out to be just fine. So we really don't know what we're in right now except that you can't just walk away and ignore it because it is unusual.

Todd Gleason: We won't, and we thank you for keeping watch on it. For sure, Ted. And as always Mike Tenurez with tstormweather at tstorm.net online joins us each and every Thursday here on the closing market report. Now speaking of joining us, I hope you've registered already for the All Day Ag Outlook. But if not, there's still time, though it's running out quickly.

It is Tuesday, March 3 at the Beef House in Covington, Indiana. The $40 includes your meal at the noon as well as a Beef House roll and coffee in the morning. See all the details online at willag.org. This is hands down, hands down the best conference for the money. The $40 buys you the farm doc team, the will ag analyst, and so very much more.

If you've never been before, this is an extraordinarily inter active conference. We have you ask questions all day long, and there aren't any PowerPoints. So it's just you and the speaker. That's right. I think it's a great conference.

I hope you will sign up today. Register now at willag.org or on the PharmDoc Daily website. I'm extension's Todd Gleason.