GRAINS-Chicago wheat falls after hitting multi-year high on Black Sea supply concerns

Chicago wheat futures turned lower on Wednesday, retreating from contract highs notched during the overnight trade and multi-year highs hit in the previous session as traders booked profits and weighed the latest developments affecting Black Sea grain exports.

Corn and soybeans also dropped from recent highs.

The most-traded wheat contract on the Chicago Board of Trade Wv1 settled 8-1/2 cents lower to $7.74 per bushel. CBOT corn Cv1 fell 2-1/2 cents to $5.43-1/2 a bushel, while soybeans Sv1 fell 7-1/2 cents to $13.10-1/4 a bushel.

"All of these markets — corn, beans and wheat — had one heck of a move and none have taken a breather," said Darin Fessler, senior hedge adviser at Lakefront Futures. "They're bending, but they're not breaking. There's a strong fundamental reason why the markets want to move higher."

Wheat reached its highest level in 3-1/2 years on Tuesday after reports Moscow had rejected a moratorium on attacks in the Black Sea region and struck port infrastructure overnight in its conflict with Ukraine.

Russia attacked Ukraine's port infrastructure and a border crossing with Romania in the southern Black Sea region of Odesa the previous night, Ukrainian officials said.

Ukraine's largest farm union UAC warned exporters on Wednesday not to expect deepwater ports to resume operations soon and to rely on alternatives.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said a mechanism is needed to ensure permanent safety of commercial maritime transport in the Black Sea before the grain crisis escalates.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture kept its good-to-excellent rating for the American corn crop unchanged at 57% in a weekly report on Monday. That rating was down from 69% a year ago.