USDA again offered up a mixed bag of grain inspection data for the week ending February 6, with different crops taking the spotlight versus the prior week. Corn was the No. 1 performer, firming moderately week-over-week and beating most trade estimates. Wheat also showed modest improvements from a week ago, while soybeans tumbled to less than half of the prior week’s tally.

Corn export inspections reached 30.3 million bushels last week, firming 37% above the prior week’s total and besting the average trade guess of 25.6 million bushels. Cumulative totals for the 2019/20 marketing year still remain significantly below last year’s pace, however, after reaching 452.5 million bushels.

Mexico was the No. 1 destination for U.S. corn export inspections last week, with 8.5 million bushels, followed closely by Japan (7.8 million) and Colombia (7.5 million). A handful of other countries, primarily from Central America, accounted for the rest of last week’s volume.

Wheat export inspections also improved from a week ago, reaching 19.2 million bushels. That tally was also above most trade estimates, which ranged between 11.0 million and 22.0 million bushels. Cumulative totals for the 2019/20 marketing year remain around 12% ahead of last year’s pace, now at 631.4 million bushels.

Bangladesh (3.2 million) and Nigeria (2.9 million) led all destinations for U.S. wheat export inspections last week. The Philippines, Japan and Guatemala rounded out the top five.

Soybean export inspections severely underperformed last week, falling beneath the trade’s range of guesses to 22.2 million bushels. Trade estimates varied between 25.7 million and 49.6 million bushels, in contrast. The total was also less than half of the prior week’s tally of 50.5 million bushels. Cumulative totals for the 2019/20 marketing year are holding 20% higher year-over-year, meantime, landing a sliver over 1 billion bushels since September.

China was the top destination for U.S. soybean inspections last week, with just under 5.0 million bushels. Other top destinations included Bangladesh, Mexico, the Netherlands and Vietnam.

Click here to read the entire latest grain export inspection data from USDA.