Soybean trader says industry skeptical of Chinese promises, and trade war has forever damaged market for U.S. beans

The trade war with China has forever damaged the market for American soybeans, and the industry is dubious of the latest Chinese promise to buy more, a prominent soybean trader told Kai Ryssdal of the radio show Marketplace on Monday.

Al Kluis, soybean trader

"The trade is very skeptical," said Al Kluis of Kluis Commodity Advisors of Wayzata, Minn. He noted at the time of the interview that soybean prices had declined 14 cents a bushel since Chinese President Xi Jinping promised to buy more U.S. farm products in exchange for President Trump postponing another $300 billion in tariffs on Chinese goods. "We need to see some real orders," Kluis said, not just talk.

Kluis told Ryssdal that the global supply chain for soy has changed permanently, and not to Americans' benefit.  "We're gonna be seeing a lot fewer acres" planted, he said. "We're giving away a lot of our hard-earned markets that we've been developing in China" to other nations such as Brazil, he said. "We will never be as dominant producing soybeans for China as we were before."

UPDATE, July 5: "The U.S. has made spectacular gains in soybean exports to the rest of the world" in the marketing year that ends Aug. 31, Dan Looker reports for Successful Farming. "They’re up by 36%, or 7.4 million metric tons, according to data provided by the Iowa Soybean Association. But that doesn’t make up for the 19 mmt tons of sales lost to China this year. So far, China has imported about 8 mmt of U.S. soybeans. In the previous marketing year, it bought 28.4 mmt of soybeans."