GRAINS-Wheat, corn ease further from multi-month highs

By Heather Schlitz

CHICAGO, Feb 17 (Reuters) - Chicago wheat futures moved back on Tuesday from multi-month highs struck in the previous week as ample global supply and technical trading weighed on the market, analysts said.

Corn followed wheat lower while soybeans ticked higher on continued hopes for Chinese purchases of U.S. soybeans, though the Lunar New Year holiday, which brings business to a halt in much of Asia, has added to demand concerns.

The most active wheat contract Wv1 on the Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT) settled 11 cents lower to $5.37-3/4 per bushel.

The contract had reached its highest point since November the previous week on a wave of short covering, which has since petered out.

Most-active CBOT corn settled 5-1/2 cents lower to $5.26-1/4 per bushel, and CBOT most-active soybeans Sv1 settled 1 cent higher to $11.34 per bushel.

Soybeans had rallied after U.S. President Donald Trump said this month that China is considering buying an additional 8 million metric tons of U.S. soybeans, and a report in the South China Morning Post said Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping could extend their countries' trade truce for as long as a year.

"We're still holding our breath to see what China is going to do with 8 million metric tons," said Dan Basse, president of AgResource Company.

An ongoing Brazilian soybean harvest and market skepticism that China will buy additional soybeans has added a ceiling to prices.

The Lunar New Year holiday and the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, which starts this week, could lead to a general slowdown in demand from some major importers of grains and oilseeds.

In wheat, news on Friday of a 3 million metric ton increase to consultancy IKAR's forecast for Russia's 2026 wheat crop, plus the announcement that India will allow the export of 2.5 million tons of wheat, drew attention back to abundant global supplies.