*
Wheat touches 1-week high before paring gains
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Cancelled China sales weigh on corn prices
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Renewed Russia-Ukraine tensions cast doubts on Black Sea
deal
(Updates prices, changes headline, changes lead, adds quotes,
changes byline, changes dateline from previous SINGAPORE/PARIS)
By Cassandra Garrison
MEXICO CITY, May 4 (Reuters) -
Chicago grains and soybean futures pared gains on Thursday, as planting progress in the U.S. and cancelled sales to China weighed on prices.
Meanwhile, wheat futures hit a one-week high earlier in the session on Black Sea doubts.
U.S. export sales of corn fell to their
lowest weekly total on record, government data showed on Thursday, as overseas buyers cancelled purchases made earlier in the year. The U.S. Department of Agriculture reported corn export sales were a net -194,600 tonnes, largely due to cancellations by China.
Wheat and soybean export sales were in line with expectations.
"It's the lack of exports that we're seeing going forward,"
said Dan Smith, a senior risk manager at U.S. consultancy Top
Third Ag Marketing.
Markets also had eyes towards the USDA's monthly World
Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates (WASDE) coming on May
12, with an expected decrease in exports.
The most-active wheat contract on the Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT) was down 0.27% at $6.38 a bushel, as of 0952 CDT (1452 GMT), after climbing earlier in the session to its highest since April 26 at $6.47-1/2. The market hit its lowest since April 2021 at $6.04 a bushel on Wednesday.
Corn fell 0.93% to $5.83 a bushel and soybeans lost 0.83% to $14.05-3/4 a bushel.
Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said Russia did not
appear to be interested in extending the Black Sea grain deal,
but that Kyiv was focused on looking for partners to fulfill the
deal and was not looking for Russian interest.
However, Russia said Wednesday it will keep talking to the
United Nations about the future of the deal that allows the safe
Black Sea export of Ukraine grain, but would not do anything to
harm its own interests.
"It will probably go down to the 23rd or 24th hour before a
decision is reached," Smith added, noting continued market
anticipation.
(Reporting by Cassandra Garrison in Mexico City, Naveen
Thukral; Editing by Sherry Jacob-Phillips, Sohini Goswami and
Andrea Ricci)
