Expansive global supply outlook helps push wheat prices lower

With wheat prices reaching a four-year low of $5.20 per bushel in late July, consumers around the world may well have recently been breathing a collective sigh of relief. They can increasingly enjoy many of their favourite foods, such as bread, pasta and noodles, at some of the lowest costs since 2020, with the supply outlook widely reported to show increasing abundance for this year and next across many of the world’s key export markets. With the first half of the 2020s heading towards completion, it is reasonable to conclude that few commodities have experienced more of a rollercoaster ride during the first four and a half years of this decade than wheat. The outbreak of war in Ukraine in late February 2022 saw wheat futures spike to all-time highs of more than $13 per bushel by early March; they proceeded to remain at elevated levels throughout the second quarter as it proved increasingly challenging for producers to ship grain exports out of the Black Sea. Russia is the ...