Wheat prices in Chicago fell 3.7% and soybeans fell 2.6% despite new Chinese purchases

Pessimism about the state of the US economy is increasing on American stock exchanges, which has forced traders to actively book profits after recent growth. As a result, wheat and soybean futures fell sharply on November 4 - by 3.7% and 2.6%, respectively, while major stock indexes fell by 0.9-1.9% due to a decrease in the number of vacancies and a decline in technology stocks.

Despite the information about new purchases of American grain by China, the market remained under pressure. According to traders, China purchased 120 thousand tons of American wheat, of which 60 thousand tons of soft and 60 thousand tons of hard spring wheat. However, this did not stop the fall - December futures for SRW wheat in Chicago fell by 3.7% to $ 196.7 / ton, leveling the previous increase of 5.7% at the beginning of the week.

Chinese state-owned COFCO also held a signing ceremony for soybean purchases from the United States, but details of the deals were not disclosed. Meanwhile, November soybean futures fell 2.6% to $401/t, completely erasing a week's gain.

Adding to the uncertainty in the market is the lack of official reports from the US Department of Agriculture, which have not been published for the sixth consecutive week due to the record-long government shutdown. This makes it impossible to fully assess the situation in agricultural markets.

American stock indexes also ended the day in the "red zone":

• S&P 500 — minus 1.1%,
• Dow Jones Industrial — minus 0.84%,
• Nasdaq 100 — minus 1.9%, reaching two-week lows.

The reason was the cooling of the labor market and the fall in shares of semiconductor companies.

According to Challenger, the number of announced job cuts in the US in October increased by 175.3% year-on-year to 153,074, which is the largest figure in the last 7 months and the highest for October since 2022. Since the beginning of the year, the number of cuts has exceeded 1 million, and the number of new hiring plans is the lowest since 2011.

Meanwhile, the U.S. Supreme Court is awaiting a ruling on the legality of President Donald Trump's tariffs. The court is likely to uphold lower court rulings that ruled the tariffs illegal because they were based on an improper reference to the International Emergency Economic Powers Act of 1977.

Chief Justice John Roberts said that imposing tariffs is effectively “a tax on Americans, which has always been the prerogative of Congress.” If tariffs are lifted, the US government could be required to return the funds already collected, which would be a serious shock to the US economy.