GRAINS-US soy futures set 15-month high after China agrees to purchases

By Tom Polansek

CHICAGO, Oct 30 (Reuters) - U.S. soybean futures reached a 15-month high on Thursday after President Donald Trump's administration said top-importer China agreed to buy tens of millions of tons of American crops in the next few years as part of a trade truce.

Farmers welcomed the agreement after China shunned U.S. soybeans as it battled with Trump over tariffs and shifted its buying to rival producers in South America. However, the deals fall short of U.S. exports to China in recent years.

"It's not over and above what they had been doing in the past, but it's definitely helpful," said Illinois farmer Sherman Newlin, who is also an analyst for Risk Management Commodities.

Most-active soybean futures Sv1 were up 12 cents at $11.06-1/2 a bushel on the Chicago Board of Trade by 11:25 a.m. CDT (1625 GMT). Prices earlier rose to $11.14-1/2, a level not seen since July 2024.

The trade dispute robbed U.S. farmers of their biggest market as they struggled with low crop prices and rising costs for inputs such as fertilizer.

Following a meeting between Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping, China will buy at least 12 million metric tons of U.S. soybeans this year, U.S. Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins said on X . China will then buy at least 25 million metric tons each year in 2026, 2027 and 2028, she said.

The U.S. exported 26.8 million metric tons to China in 2024; 26.4 million metric tons in 2023; and 30.2 million metric tons in 2022, according to U.S. government data.

U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said other countries in Southeast Asia agreed to buy another 19 million tons of U.S. soybeans, but did not specify a timeframe for those purchases.

In the near term, exporters will probably need to buy U.S. soybeans to ship to China quickly, said Don Roose, president of Iowa brokerage U.S. Commodities. However, the trade deal looks underwhelming over the longer term because of uncertainty about whether China will live up to its commitments, he said.

In 2020, Trump signed a "Phase One" trade deal with Beijing to end his first-term U.S.-China trade war. Beijing never met the purchase targets in the agreement.

"We've seen this before," Roose said.

In other markets, CBOT corn Cv1 fell 2 cents to $4.32 a bushel and wheat Wv1 dropped 7-1/4 cents to $5.25 a bushel.