Closing Market Report

The August 12, 2026, broadcast of the Closing Market Report, hosted by Todd Gleason, provides a comprehensive overview of the latest USDA crop production numbers and global agricultural weather. Greg Johnson of Total Grain Marketing joins the program to analyze the market's reaction to the USDA data, noting that unexpected increases in corn and soybean planted acres were offset by lowered yield estimates, resulting in tighter ending stocks and a boost to prices. Following this market breakdown, meteorologist Drew Lerner from World Weather Inc. outlines the weather landscape, detailing recent severe storm impacts in the Midwest, ongoing dryness in parts of the U.S. and Western Europe, and generally favorable crop conditions across the Black Sea region and China.

01:11 USDA Report Numbers in Review
03:36 Ag Markets with Greg Johnson, Total Grain Marketing
13:56 Edge of Field Conservation Practices Field Day in Cisco Tomorrow
14:39 Ag Weather with Drew Lerner, World Weather Inc.

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Creators and Guests

Host

Todd E. Gleason🎙🇺🇸

University of Illinois

What is Closing Market Report?

Established 1985

The Closing Market Report airs weekdays at 2:06pm central on WILL AM580, Urbana. University of Illinois Extension Farm Broadcaster Todd Gleason hosts the program. Each day he asks commodity analysts about the trade in Chicago, delves deep into the global growing regions weather, and talks with ag economists, entomologists, agronomists, and others involved in agriculture at the farm and industry level.

website: willag.org
twitter: @commodityweek

cmr260812

01:11 USDA Report Numbers in Review
03:36 Ag Markets with Greg Johnson, Total Grain Marketing
13:56 Edge of Field Conservation Practices Field Day in Cisco Tomorrow
14:39 Ag Weather with Drew Lerner, World Weather Inc.

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Todd Gleason: From the Land Grant University in Urbana-Champaign, Illinois, this is the Closing Market Report for the 12th day of August, 2026. It’s USDA Report Day. I’m Illinois Extension’s Todd Gleason. Coming up, we’ll talk about the numbers released by the United States Department of Agriculture at 11:00 this morning, the world agricultural supply and demand estimates, and the first corn and soybean crop production report. We’ll do that with Greg Johnson. He’s at TGM, that’s Total Grain Marketing, the elevator right here in Champaign County. We’ll also turn our attention to the weather forecast. It’s been difficult across the Midwest as it relates to wind and rain both. We’ll hear from Drew about the impacts and what might yet still be to come. We’ll also make a tour of some of the Northern Hemisphere growing regions as well, on this Wednesday edition of the Closing Market Report that does come to you from Illinois Public Medium. It is public radio for the farming world online on demand at willag.org or search up the Closing Market Report by name in your favorite podcast applications.

Todd Gleason: Let’s begin with a quick review of this morning’s USDA numbers. We’ll have more detail in just a moment. Corn production for grain forecast at 16,000,000 bushels, that’s down 6% from last year and would represent still the second highest production on record if realized. The average yield, according to USDA, is forecast now at 180.7 bushels to the acre. That’s down 5.8 bushels from last year. It’s down from the 183 USDA was previously using for this year. Soybean production for beans forecast at 4.52 billion bushels in total, up 6% from 2025. The average yield forecast at 52.7 bushels to the acre. That’s down .3 bushels from last year and also down .3 bushels from the earlier in this year estimate from USDA.

Announce: Todd Gleason services are made available to WILL by University of Illinois Extension.

01:11 USDA Report Numbers in Review

Todd Gleason: September corn for the day settled at $4.57 20 and a quarter higher. December up 20 and a quarter cents. $4.80 and three-quarters the settlement for the new crop. March at $4.96 and a half, 20 and a half cents higher. September soybeans up 13 and three-quarters the settlement, $11.65 and a quarter. November 11:83 and a quarter, 14 and a half higher. And January, $11.99, up 14 and three-quarters of a cent. Meal 350 higher. Bean oil up 59 cents. Wheat futures December up 21 and a half. The settlement price for the soft red at $6.69 and three-quarters, the hard red December at $7.37 and three-quarters, up 21 and three-quarters of a cent. Live cattle futures, down $2.52 and a half at $223.80. Feeders, $339.35, $5.90 lower, and lean hogs, $83.55, up 22 and a half cents for the day. Crude oil, $83.30 a barrel, a dime higher. That’s for the West Texas. Crude oil for the Brent at $88.97, 6 cents higher. The wholesale price or harbor price for diesel fuel at $4.30 and 3 tenths, up a nickel and two-tenths. And gasoline on wholesale at $3.15 and 3 tenths, that’s the RBOB, a penny and 7 tenths of a cent higher for the day.

03:36 Ag Markets with Greg Johnson, Total Grain Marketing

Todd Gleason: Greg Johnson from TGM, that’s Total Grain Marketing, now joins us. He’s at the elevator right here in Champaign County. Hi Greg. Thanks for being with us on this USDA report day.

Greg Johnson: Good to be with you and good to talk about some good numbers for a change.

Todd Gleason: Well, tell me about those numbers. What did they uh mean to the marketplace to begin with as soon as they were released?

Greg Johnson: Well, the uh corn acres were increased, which we were afraid of. Uh we were hoping we wouldn’t have a repeat of last year and uh to some extent we did. Uh the government raised the corn acres from 95.3 million last month to 96.7. So that’s a 1.4 million acreage increase in uh the planted acres, a 1.2 million increase in the harvested acres. The good news is that was almost entirely offset by a lowering of the yield. Government was using 183. Everybody thought that was a little high, but they didn’t know whether the government would change that in this month’s report or just gradually lower into it over time. Uh they took a good chunk out of it. They took 2.3 bushels per acre out and now we’re at 180.7. So that uh gets your uh production uh keeps your production right at 16 million bushels or 16 billion bushels, uh which is where the government was last year or last month. Um, most of the demand side of the equation stayed the same with the exception of exports. They did increase corn exports by another 75 million bushels from 3.2 billion to 3.275. And so with that 75 billion bushel increase in exports and uh the lower yield, uh which took the production down a little bit, even with the increased acres, uh we get the ending stocks of corn down from 1.8 billion, 1.79, but basically 1.8 to 1.65. So about a 140 million bushel decrease in ending stocks. So that uh obviously um is uh friendly. Uh tightens up the balance sheet a little bit and as a result corn is up in double digits uh so far this morning.

Todd Gleason: Yeah. And USDA said the season’s average cash price should be 10 cents higher. So I suppose those kind of go hand in hand. Do you think producers can expect very much more movement to the upside?

Greg Johnson: Well, now once we get past the report, now we go back to focusing on the weather, uh and there’s a lot of variability out there and these storms that are going through week are doing some damage. So, uh you could argue that we could see a uh slightly lower yields in subsequent reports. So, I think uh there is a chance for uh higher prices. It may not be until after harvest, but uh I think the potential’s there for farmers that have on-farm storage that uh the bins could uh could pay for themselves this year.

Todd Gleason: How much widespread wind damage do you think was made in the recent set of storms?

Greg Johnson: You know, the one earlier this week in Iowa uh was five or six counties. So it’s in the big picture, it’s really not enough. But now you take the storm that went through yesterday and now you take the storm that’s going through today and there’s two more chances of storms later this week. So, you know, it’s not a lot in any one particular storm, but you know, you start adding it up and uh you know, with the kind of demand that we’re seeing uh we and now the carryout is getting a little tighter at 1.65, uh we really can’t afford to lose a whole lot more. So, um we really won’t know um you know until the you know harvest starts how much we actually lost, but just the perception that we’re losing a few bushels here and there probably is supportive to the market.

Todd Gleason: Today’s supply and demand table from USDA gives us a stocks to use of 10.12%. That would be kind of the tipping point sort of normal. But the point I guess is that it’s normal at this time. If we happen to lose more bushels somewhere along the line, it makes the volatility in the marketplace more… it is easier to push it further faster, I suppose, in both directions?

Greg Johnson: You’re right. The rule of thumb is anything under 10% sends a signal to the market that we need to start rationing demand. We’re at 10.1, so we’re not quite there yet, but we’re awfully, awfully close to that tipping point. If the government would lower the yield uh in subsequent reports, we could get that stocks to use ratio under 10% uh which kind of is one of those triggers to the funds and everyone else that uh hey maybe we want to buy a little bit more corn uh just in case. So, um yeah, you’re right. 10.1 is not quite the tipping point, but we’re looking over the edge at it right now.

Todd Gleason: So you told us uh that USDA gave us 1.4 million more planted acres for corn. As it happens, they also gave us 1.4 million more planted acres for soybeans. Unusual that both would go up. That gives us a big number for the combined set.

Greg Johnson: It really does. If you add corn and bean acres together, it uh totals 183.5 million. Last year, the total of corn and beans was 180 exactly. So that’s 3.5 million more acres combined. Most of that is coming from soybeans uh this year versus last, but still that combination adds up to 3.5 million acres. So the question is going to be where did those acres come from or did we just have overall more acres in general in the United States? That’s hard to imagine that we did. So, you know, maybe we lost a few wheat acres, maybe we lost a little bit of pasture acres, but we had to take those acres from somewhere according to the government. We got 3.5 million more acres of corn and bean acres this year versus last year.

Todd Gleason: And then if you looked at season’s average cash price, USDA raised it a dime, despite the fact that they put soybean ending stocks 10 million bushels higher at 320 million bushels.

Greg Johnson: Average farm price, yeah, it’s still uh 11.40. I think that’s where it was a month ago. Um, but you’re right, they did raise ending stocks from 310 to 320. Still tight. Um, it kind of boils down… It still boils down to China. Um, USDA has China buying that 25 million metric tons and uh there was another flash sale this morning. So, China is working its way towards buying that 25 million metric tons, but they’re probably only 30–35% uh of what the USDA is assuming they’re going to buy. So, the good news is they are buying and they’re making uh progress towards that 25 million. You know, I guess the bad news is we’re not there yet and uh you know, it’s going to take a while before they get to the 25 million metric tons, but at least they’re heading in the right direction. So, um yeah, China’s the big wild card uh as far as soybean prices going forward as well as what kind of August weather we have to finish out this soybean crop.

Todd Gleason: Thank you for the clarification. Many numbers in front of me, yes. The season’s average cash price did not change at $11.40. It was of course the ending stocks that went up 10 million bushels from 310 to 320. A couple of other numbers from the soybeans we should take a look at. Yield for soybeans down three-tenths of a bushel to 52.7 bushels to the acre. What do you think of that figure?

Greg Johnson: Again, I think it should be 52 and a half. I think most of the private analysts think it’s probably a little bit lower than the 53 that they were using. Um, I wasn’t sure whether they would change it this early. A lot of times USDA will wait until we get another month or two down the road until they uh come up with some you know because they haven’t done any objective uh measuring sampling yet. This is all based on farmer survey, but uh obviously this tells you that the farmers are responding with lower yields than what they thought a month ago, which kind of makes sense. So, um three-tenths of a bushel lower, probably wouldn’t be surprised to see that drop another two-tenths uh in the next report or two.

Todd Gleason: Yeah, so some of the interesting figures that came from USDA’s executive summary, there was uh a Mississippi divide on lower yields for soybeans and higher yields for soybeans—to the East mostly higher, to the West mostly lower. Kansas the loser there. They were down 21.6 bushels the acre from last year. The big winner was actually New York State. Get this number. They must have had a 25 bushel uh average last year. They have a 50 bushel average this year. Just unbelievable, up 25. And Illinois for its part, a 67 bushel average up 7.2 bushels to the acre from last year. So those are some big numbers uh in changes on both sides, but we end up with a slightly lower uh total yield at 52.7. Uh but still a wash because of the acres for the most part. What should farmers be thinking about if anything that’s new in their marketing plans because of these?

Greg Johnson: The corn market has rallied back now to the top half of the range. So, if you need to sell bushels uh and don’t want to pay DP or storage charges and if you don’t have your own bins, this might be an opportunity to get some grain sold on this rally uh before we get into fall harvest. I do think post-harvest we’ll probably see higher prices, but we may go lower into harvest before we bounce back post-harvest. So, this may be a selling opportunity for people that don’t want to or are unable to hold on to corn into the winter. Um and as far as soybeans go, as we said all along, these are good prices. Uh if you knew for sure China was going to buy the whole 25 million metric tons and even more, you could probably hold on for $12 beans again. Uh that could very well happen, but uh the one thing I do know is if you sell beans at $11.75, which I think we’re getting close to, um you know at a 70 bushel yield that uh that pays the bills. So, at some point in time we have to transition or switch from price forecasting to locking in profits and it’s a lot easier to do that on beans than it is on corn.

Todd Gleason: Hey, thanks much. I appreciate it.

Greg Johnson: Hey, thank you, Todd.

Todd Gleason: Mmhmm. That’s Greg Johnson. He is with TGM, that’s totalgrainmarketing.com.

Todd Gleason: You’re listening to the Closing Market Report from Illinois Public Medium. It is public radio for the farming world. Our theme music is written, performed, produced, and courtesy of Logan County, Illinois farmer, Tim Gleason. Be sure to visit our website at willag.org, w-i-l-l-a-g.org. There you can find today’s USDA report numbers. They’re under the USDA tab. I’ll try to put the updated numbers from Brazil up when they come out tomorrow morning as well. And then we’ll also have there as we always do, the latest information from the crop scientist as well as the ag economist and animal scientist from the University of Illinois.

13:56 Edge of Field Conservation Practices Field Day in Cisco Tomorrow
Todd Gleason: You should check out our calendar of events including the Edge of Field Conservation Practices Field Day that takes place in Cisco tomorrow. That starts at 9:00 a.m., runs to 1:00 in the afternoon. They’ll be talking about conservation and drainage practices. You should join us for the edge of field practices that farmers can put into place. This is a partnership collaboration among the Illinois Farm Bureau, the Illinois Land Improvement Contractors Association, USDA NRCS, University of Illinois, and SIU as well. We’ll look forward to seeing you in Cisco. Details are in our calendar at willag.org, look for Edge of Field Conservation Practices Field Day. I’m Illinois Extension’s Todd Gleason.

14:39 Ag Weather with Drew Lerner, World Weather Inc.
Todd Gleason: Let’s turn our attention to the weather forecast. Drew Lerner is here from World Weather Incorporated in Kansas City. Hello Drew. Thanks for being with us. We’ve got uh a lot of weather to talk about. Tell me about the storms today, tomorrow through the weekend uh in the United States.

Drew Lerner: Well, you know the storms that we had yesterday, the derecho that occurred across parts of the Midwest was certainly uh a significant event for some folks. It wasn’t quite the uh the solid line that occurred from one end of the country to the other that we saw in 2020, I believe. But uh and the impact was a lot lighter. But there is another opportunity for such conditions to occur again. Uh that’ll be tomorrow night going into uh Friday. And uh during that time period, we could see some impressive thunderstorms starting out in southern parts of South Dakota and working their way uh across the heart of the Midwest. Now, these storms uh will need to be uh certainly closely monitored for their potential for severe impact. Obviously, a lot of damaging wind and some uh hail uh will likely have some risk to the crops out there. We’re going to have a a little bit of thunderstorm activity of significance already uh during the afternoon today across northern Illinois and into portions of uh Ohio. And so we’re just going to kind of keep this train going here with uh the next two or three days providing quite a few thunderstorms that will uh perhaps threaten some of the crop. But outside of that, you know, just to the south of all this active weather, we’re going to see some rather quiet conditions from Kansas and Missouri all the way down to Texas and the Delta. These areas are not likely to see much rain at all. In fact, it’s going to be hot and humid and pretty ugly. Uh we do expect to see crop stress on the rise in the Delta and in parts of Kansas and Missouri. Although uh in Kansas and Missouri in particular, there have been some decent rains recently and the subsoil moisture profile is still pretty good. And up in the northwestern Corn Belt, of course, we still have a lot of dryness up that way. But these thunderstorms I’ve talked about will uh manage to whittle away at some of that dryness. It’ll take probably four or five days before everybody has received some rain, but eventually we will bring moisture to much of that region that has been drier. Biased, the only question would be maybe parts of eastern North Dakota and northwestern Minnesota that may have a tough time getting a good drink of water.

Todd Gleason: If you look uh deeper into August, maybe closer to the end of August, how do you think things will develop across the Midwest?

Drew Lerner: You know, I think we’re going to be still in the same rut as we get into the last days of August. Uh the ridge of high pressure is going to continue primarily anchored over the Rocky Mountains with a lobe uh off to the southeast or the southern plains to the uh Central Gulf of America coastal region. So, I think we’ll finish out this month with a very status quo weather forecast. So we will continue to produce showers and thunderstorms from the northern plains through the heart of the Midwest and into the southeastern states, while the southern plains and Delta continue to to fight that dryness. There will be, by the way, some relief up in Canada in the northwestern US plains uh starting here in the next couple of days. And uh so I think they will have moved beyond the peak of their worst conditions as well.

Todd Gleason: Are the droughts and heats speaking of that continuing in parts of France, uh Spain, the UK, other areas in Western Europe?

Drew Lerner: Yeah, they are today. But there’s actually some sign of hope that they may get some rains as we move forward through this next uh week to week and a half. We’ll start off with very dry conditions and some very hot conditions still occurring over these next two or three days. But as we get into the weekend, I think there will be an opportunity for some scattered storms. And next week, uh the pattern could become just a little more active yet, and relief will occur in portions of France and the UK, Belgium and Germany. But, you know, as long as they have been drier biased, it’s going to take a whole lot more than a week’s worth of scattered showers and thunderstorms to make a big difference. They will see an end to the steady decline in crop conditions, but I think turning around any part of the production potential that’s not very likely.

Todd Gleason: Moving to the east uh through the Black Sea area, parts of Ukraine and Russia, uh while the crop may not be able to move uh through the export channels, at least through the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov, uh very easily. I think they’ll have a crop. Can you tell me about it?

Drew Lerner: Yeah, they’ve actually had a very good growing season up until about a week ago and uh I think their yield potentials are pretty high. There really hasn’t been much excessive heat and uh actually that feature, the lack of heat has really helped here in the most recent week or two with the ground drying down. Now, they still have a little ways to go in their growing season and it does not look like there’s going to be high volumes of moisture in that part of the world over this next couple of weeks. And so they will continue to dry down. So they may get a little bit of a shaving on their yield, but it shouldn’t be a big deal. Um there’s no excessive heat being advertised. Subsoil moisture is going to be marginal, but not absent. So, I think the crop will probably just be pushed to uh the finish line just a little bit quicker than usual, but without a huge impact on their bottom line production.

Todd Gleason: Finally, we know that in China uh tropical storm Dolphin had an impact on the export facilities from Shanghai going to the southeast, maybe some of the rice growing regions as well, but to the northeast uh part of that country where most of the corn is grown, uh what can you tell me about the crop this year?

Drew Lerner: Yeah, they’ve had a regular diet of showers and thunderstorms throughout their growing season and temperatures have been seasonal. It’s been uh somewhat comparable to what we’ve seen in the heart of the US Midwest. And so I think the production is going to be fairly high. They could have used maybe just a little bit more warmth once in a while, but I don’t think it was a notable issue. And so for all practical purposes, their yield potential is good and I don’t see it changing. This pattern will prevail on into the end of this month as well as in the US.

Todd Gleason: And the southern growing regions which the soybeans would project down into, are they doing okay this year too?

Drew Lerner: Yeah, for the most part. There was a short-term bout of both excessive rain and some dryness, but I don’t think that either period of extremes lasted long enough to have a big impact on the bottom line. Now, some of the minor soybean areas and some minor groundnut areas in the south of the country uh where rice is primarily the main crop, it’s been fairly wet there, but I, you know, I don’t think we expect to see a few beans produced uh relative to their total for the country in that particular region. So, I don’t think the impact is very great. So, the beans should do well as well as corn.

Todd Gleason: Thank you, much. I appreciate it, Drew.

Drew Lerner: You bet. Have a great day.

Todd Gleason: You too. Drew Lerner is with World Weather Incorporated in Kansas City. Joined us on this Wednesday edition of the Closing Market Report that came to you from Illinois Public Medium. It is public radio for the farming world online on demand at willag.org, that’s w-i-l-l-a-g-dot-o-r-g.

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