GRAINS-Wheat soars after US efforts to end Black Sea conflicts yield little progress
WEAT•Wheat futures rise as peace efforts stall
BEIJING, Sept 8 (Reuters) - Chicago wheat futures jumped on Tuesday, as hope dimmed for the U.S. diplomatic push to end the Ukrainian war, which has disrupted shipments out of the Black Sea region. Soybeans and corn also gained.
The most-traded wheat contract on the Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT) Wv1 jumped 3% at $7.56-1/2 a bushel by 0235 GMT. CBOT corn Cv1 gained 0.7% to $5.40-1/4 a bushel, while soybeans Sv1 rose 0.2% to $13.12 a bushel.
U.S. peace envoys Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff met Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy in Kyiv over the weekend, but their diplomatic efforts did not appear to secure a breakthrough in ending the war.
Traders said the U.S. envoys' visit to Russia did not seem to have resulted in a peace breakthrough that would enable Ukrainian and Russian grain exports to resume.
Tit-for-tat attacks by Russia and Ukraine on each other's ports and shipping have brought the countries' Black Sea exports to a near halt, prompting buyers to look for alternatives.
The Black Sea grain export disruptions led Asian wheat importers to buy at least half a million metric tons of Australian and Argentine wheat in recent deals, trade sources said last week.
Market participants remain on edge over the risks of a prolonged interruption to Russian and Ukrainian grain exports from the Black Sea regions.
Soybeans have been supported by Chinese purchases of U.S. soybeans and concerns over hot, dry weather in key U.S. growing areas.
China's soybean imports totalled 74.11 million metric tons in the January-August period, up 1.1% from 73.33 million tons a year earlier, data from the country's General Administration of Customs showed on Tuesday.
Imports by the world's largest soybean buyer fell 1.1% in August from a year earlier to 12.14 million tons, the data showed.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture said last week exporters sold 192,000 tons of soybeans to China for delivery in the 2026/27 marketing year.
