India: Spot Soybean Down on Strong Rupee

 Soybean prices were down Friday on Indian rupee appreciation against US dollar and weak e-CBOT prices, said traders. “Rupee has appreciated more than 8% from its record low of 54.30 on December 15,” said Hitesh Agrawal, a soybean trader.

At 1100 AM in Mumbai, rupee appreciated to 49.665 a dollar, which means 1.4% gains this week.  Analysts, too, feel that strong rupee is putting pressure on Indian soybean prices. “Strong rupee means cheap and increased vegetable oil imports and low soymeal export realizations,” said Badruddin Khan, assistant vice president-research, Angel Commodities.

India is one of the biggest vegetable oil importers in the world. 
Increased soyoil imports mean lower prices. Soybean is crushed to make soyoil and soymeal.

Also, fear of weak oilmeal demand from China is making the market sentiment negative, added Khan. China banned imports of oilmeal from India saying it has found traces of a hazardous chemical in some rapeseed meal shipments, the Solvent Extractors Association of India said Monday.

China is the fourth-largest oilmeal importer from India and it buys large quantities of rapeseed meal and soymeal from the South Asian country.
India is one of the biggest soymeal exporters to South East Asian countries. Also, weak electronic CBOT prices affected the domestic market sentiment.

March soybean contract on electronic CBOT was at 1219.75 cents a bushel, down 3 cents from its previous close. Friday, farmers delivered around 6000 bags of 100 kg each to Indore. Across Madhya Pradesh, arrivals were 150,000 bags. Madhya Pradesh is the biggest soybean producing state of India.

Soybean prices in Indore mandi auctions were in Rs 2360-2420 per 100 kg range. Highest prices in Sanyogita Ganj mandi were Rs 2460-2470 per 100 kg. Sanyogita Ganj mandi is the biggest grain mandi in Indore.
Indore is soybean trade hub of India. Plant delivery prices were Rs 2490-2520 per 100 kg.