U.S. balance sheets updated
The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) lowered the national average corn yield to 175.4 bushels per acre in the August World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates (WASDE) report, a decline of 1.6 bushels per acre from July.

When combined with a decrease in harvested acres of 100,000, this lowered the U.S. corn crop by 146 million bushels to a level of 14.36 billion bushels. Old crop ending stocks were bumped 20 million bushels higher to 1.53 billion bushels, mainly due to a decrease in ethanol use.

New crop ending stocks were lowered 81 million bushels to 1.388 billion bushels. Lower new crop production was partially offset by decreases in feed and export demand. The new crop stocks-to-use is now at 9.6%, which is a rationing level.

On the soybean side, the USDA surprised the trade by raising the national average yield by 0.5...