By Naveen Thukral and Ella Cao
SINGAPORE/BEIJING, Jan 6 (Reuters) – China’s state stockpiler Sinograin bought 10 U.S. soybean cargoes this week, three traders told Reuters on Tuesday, as the world’s top buyer continues purchasing from the United States following a late-October trade truce.
The cargoes, totalling around 600,000 metric tons, are for shipment between March and May, with overall U.S. soybean purchases now approaching 10 million tons, the traders said.
That represents over 80% of the 12 million metric tons that U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said China pledged to buy by the end of February.
“There were more U.S. cargoes bought by Sinograin and total purchases are very close to 10 million tons,” said one of the traders with direct knowledge of the deals. “We think China will buy couple of million tons more to meet the target.”
China’s buying has underpinned Chicago soybeans in recent weeks, helping the market end 2025 on a positive note, as the resumption of imports from the United States following a thaw in Beijing–Washington relations has erased most of the losses incurred during the trade war.
Chicago soybeans were trading up 0.1% at $10.62 a bushel as of 1140 GMT on Tuesday.
Beijing has stepped up U.S. soybean purchases despite a domestic supply glut driven by record South American arrivals and weak demand.
In December, Sinograin held three public auctions to make room for U.S. shipments amid ample domestic supplies.
However, average prices and clearance rates fell in successive rounds, with only one-third of soybeans sold in the final auction, Reuters previously reported.
Traders had expected Sinograin to sell around 4 million metric tons in the auctions.
(Reporting by Ella Cao in Beijing, Naveen Thukral in Singapore and Gus Trompiz in Paris, Editing by Louise Heavens)
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