Buy the Rumor Sell the Fact? 11/18/2025

January soybeans pushed to new annual highs early Tuesday, Nov 18th, briefly trading $11.69½ as New York got to their desks around 8:00 AM and positioned ahead of USDA’s 8:00 AM flash sales report. USDA confirmed 792,000 MT sold to China, about 7 to 8 cargoes. That’s a solid headline, but below Monday’s trade chatter, and beans gave up ground fast after the open. Futures posted their daily low within 30 minutes and settled ~4 cents off the bottom, down 3-¾ on the day.

The sales offered partial confirmation for Monday’s rally, but the tone quickly shifted to disappointment. This was a textbook “buy the rumor, sell the fact” trade. With up to 48 hours to report, the market is still hoping more volume shows up in the next round of flash sales, but traders were clearly expecting a bigger number right out of the gate.

More importantly, these Chinese purchases weren’t price-driven. U.S. beans to China are running more than $1.00/bushel above comparable Brazilian offers. These were political bushels, booked for optics after recent summit diplomacy, not because U.S. beans were the best value. Political buying is notoriously unreliable. If the U.S. premium holds, it suggests that demand perhaps might not.

Meanwhile, Brazil remains the low-cost anchor. ABIOVE trimmed its crop forecast slightly to 177.7 MMT but left record crush and export projections unchanged. Back in the U.S., domestic crush is the lone bright spot, October set a record and cumulative crush is running 13% ahead of last year. But we’re still well off from the administration’s 12 MMT China target, and with CFTC positioning data delayed until late January, this market is more opaque than usual, which could increase volatility ahead.

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