Perspective: Mid-Day Commentary for March 19

By: Arlan Suderman, Chief Commodities Economist

Thu, 19 Mar 2026, 16:00

March 19 – The major stock indexes are now trading at their lowest level since November, with the Dow Jones and Nasdaq both down ~0.9% at the time of writing while the S&P 500 is down 0.75%. The VIX has come off its morning highs in the mid 27’s but remains in the green on the day, hovering near the 25.4 level. The dollar has faded through the morning, now trading around the 99.8 level, though this remains elevated compared to early 2026 trade. Treasuries remain up notably on the day, with 10-year yields at 4.28% and 2-year yields at 3.86%. WTI crude oil has reversed course from morning losses to now break back into the green, hovering right around the $100/barrel mark at midday, while Brent crude remains up roughly 5% on the day to sit around $113/barrel. The ags have turned mixed after their higher start, with portions of the wheat complex now in the red and the livestock sector now selling off fairly aggressively, led down by feeder cattle.

New home sales in the U.S. tanked in January, falling 17.6% month-on-month to a seasonally adjusted annualized rate of only 587k. That’s the sharpest monthly decline in new home sales seen since 2013 and the weakest annualized rate seen since October 2022. Part of this dramatic drop was likely influenced by the widespread winter storms in the month, as the Northeast (-44%) and Midwest (-33.9%) saw by far the sharpest drops, but the weakness was widespread, as the West (-21.6%) and South (-8.1%) were both notably softer. Analyst expectations were for only a slight drop in the month to an annualized rate of 720k (with the low-end being 675k), while December was also revised lower from the 745k initially reported down to 712k. At the same time, U.S. building permits fell 4.7% month-on-month in January, the sharpest drop since March 2024 but not as sharp as the anticipated -5.4% estimate, to a seasonally adjusted annualized rate of 1.386M. Multi-unit permits saw a sharp -12.4% month-on-month drop, while single-family permits were down only 0.6% month-on-month.

U.S. exporters sold only 11.0 million bushels of soybeans in the week ending March 12, below the low-end analyst estimate of 12.9 million and marking a five-week low. China was again the top destination for the week, but at less than 3 million bushels, it’s not exactly enough to make a dent as cumulative ‘25/’26 marketing year to date sales remain 18.7% behind this time last year and the delay to the planned Trump/Xi meeting in Beijing makes USDA’s 1.575 billion bushel export target look more difficult to achieve, especially given hefty stocks in China and significantly cheaper Brazilian new crop supply. Healthy domestic use helps offset this lost export demand, however, and the market still appears more optimistic for the ‘26/’27 balance sheet as new crop soybeans lead the grains and oilseeds higher. Keep in mind this is still contingent on ongoing policy support, but the market does expect to finally get clarity on that next week.

Elsewhere, weekly export sales for the ‘25/’26 marketing year were largely in line with expectations, with corn right in the middle of its expected range at 46.1 million bushels, as were soybean meal (220.9k MT) and soybean oil (5.2k MT). Old crop (‘25/’26) wheat sales of only 7.0 million bushels look ugly on the surface, as that would represent a nine-week low, but new crop (‘26/’27) sales of 7.8 million bushels were significantly stronger than expected, helping cushion the blow. If you combine the two marketing years, total weekly wheat export sales of 14.8 million bushels were effectively right in the middle of analyst estimates. Finally, weekly milo (sorghum) export sales were soft again at only 0.5 million bushels. After running extremely hot through the winter, U.S. milo export sales have really cooled off in the last month.

Back-and-forth strikes on natural gas infrastructure in the Middle East sent nearby Dutch TTF prices soaring over 30% higher to touch their highest level since January 2023 to start the session, nearing the $25/MMBtu mark, but has since cooled from the overnight highs. Why did I choose to focus specifically on the European gas market’s reaction? Not just because they’re one of the most vulnerable markets to this conflict from a supply perspective, but because Europe has essentially become the global nitrogen market’s swing producer post-Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Skyrocketing gas values in Europe mean even worse production economics for European fertilizer producers, leading to increased demand for imports. That becomes more complicated given the ongoing blockage of the Strait and unwillingness to do business with Russia. While this sounds far away from us in the U.S., it’s important to keep in mind that this will force the inland markets to compete more directly with the export markets to keep our tons at home ahead of the heart of the spring season. Obviously, the short-term focus of the ongoing conflict in the Middle East is on movement through the Strait of Hormuz, but the longer-term focus should be on how much energy infrastructure is damaged.

The fertilizer market is a prime example of this. Part of the rise in global urea values in the months prior to the war breaking out was the loss of Iranian production starting in mid-December. That was largely a function of the lingering impact of infrastructure damage in the South Pars field (which was hit again yesterday) that led to domestic gas shortages that ultimately saw the limited supply being prioritized to heat homes over the winter instead of running their fertilizer plants. Iran responded to this attack by striking Qatar’s Ras Laffan complex, the world’s largest LNG production facility, which had already been hit in the first days of the war. QatarEnergy’s CEO said the attack has knocked out 17% of Qatar’s LNG export capacity, causing a potential $20B+ loss in annual revenue potential with the repairs possibly taking as long as three to five years. There are immense longer-term downstream impacts to this kind of infrastructure loss to consider, but until the conflict ends, it’s impossible to know the full extent of the hole the market will be digging out from.

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Perspective: Morning Commentary for August 7

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Mike CastleThu, 06 Aug 2026, 13:24

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Mike CastleWed, 05 Aug 2026, 15:19

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