Over the past couple of days, corn has given people a little breathing room.
Shandong has also been doing its part: corn arrivals have fallen sharply. They were over a thousand before; yesterday there were more than 300, and today only more than 200 trucks remain.
With fewer trucks, prices have responded, and some deep-processing companies have started raising their prices.
In the Northeast, prices have also stabilized slightly over the past couple of days, with relatively little fluctuation.
Overall, corn appears to be stabilizing.
But I’d say it’s too early to breathe easy, because it’s clear that the current situation is only an illusion caused by the weather.
The increase in arrivals in Shandong 200 trucks does not mean selling pressure has eased, nor that grain holders are collectively holding back sales; it is because of rain and disrupted transportation.
But the rain won't last forever. The skies always clear eventually, and this kind of situation has played out in Shandong far too many times before: when the rain comes, volumes drop; when it stops, they surge again immediately.
So holding back and rushing to buy are two different things.
And according to the weather forecast, Shandong will be completely sunny and warmer in just 20 days.
So can we let our guard down?
It can't loosen.
As for the Northeast, its price stabilization is also most likely an illusion.
A few days ago, prices in Heilongjiang, Jilin, and Liaoning turned positive, and many people thought corn prices in the Northeast were about to stabilize.
But what about today?
Fujin Xiangyu’s wet grain purchase price has fallen to 1970 yuan/ton, officially breaking below the 2000 threshold; prices at major buyers in Heilongjiang, Jilin, and Liaoning have broadly fallen by another 10 to 20 yuan.
It stabilized for just one day, then immediately fell again. That alone says a lot.
Why has the Northeast been able to stabilize for a while recently?
For the same reason as Shandong—the weather.
Once rain or snow sets in and temperatures drop, the pace of harvesting and grain deliveries gets disrupted. With no grain coming in, prices naturally stop falling.
But this “stability” is being propped up jointly by the weather and market sentiment, not by a genuine improvement in supply and demand.
Northeast China is having a bumper harvest this year. Ground-stored and wet grain is piled up there, and its moisture content changes every day. The longer it sits, the greater the risk of mold. As soon as the weather warms up and a window opens, incoming volumes will surge, and this wave of “stability” will quickly be exposed for what it is.
However, the weather forecast shows that it looks like rain or snow may return to Northeast China in a couple of days.
But this may not be a good thing.
Because it is still nowhere near freezing weather, the snow will melt and the roads will dry, so not a single jin of the grain that needs to be sold will escape the market.
This creates a very tricky situation: the weather keeps pushing the increase in supply further back. On the surface, each delay looks like “good news,” but in reality, grain is being accumulated batch by batch.
The more the weather delays things, the greater the pressure from the concentrated increase in supply later on.
It’s like a landslide-dammed lake: while the water is held back, everything seems calm, but the water level keeps rising. When the window finally opens, several rounds of accumulated grain are released all at once, and that’s when the impact is greatest.
So the current stabilization may not be genuine stability; there could be a greater risk of a surge in supply building up later.
So when will corn truly stabilize?
First, the peak in supply needs to have genuinely passed.
It’s not about seeing fewer trucks on a single day. The key is to see whether, after the weather clears and volumes rebound in another wave, prices can hold up and stop making new lows. Only then will it show that the heaviest blow from supply has been absorbed.
Second, policy grain purchases are beginning in full.
Today, all lots in China Grain Reserves Group’s dedicated procurement session in Chengdu went unsold; not a single transaction was made. The market generally interpreted this as meaning that the posted prices were too low and the floor price may need to be raised.
But this is still only a widespread expectation. The bottom will have genuine support only when the reserves buyer actually enters the market with real money.
But even if both of these things happen, stay clear-headed: that would mean stabilization, not a reversal.
This year has been a bumper corn harvest, and the pressure from a temporary oversupply is plain to see. Inventories at northern ports have piled up to a high of 187 ten thousand tonnes. Although demand is supported by high feed use and corn’s price advantage over wheat, that still isn’t enough to absorb such a large increase in supply all at once.
There really isn’t much room left for prices to fall sharply, but not one of the mountains weighing on prices has been moved.
So at this critical juncture, don’t let your guard down, and don’t mistake the boost borrowed from the weather for corn’s own strength.
Keep a close eye on the first wave of increased supply after the weather clears, and on the purchase floor price set by Sinograin—the real test for corn may only just be beginning.