With nearly seven months gone, an ambitious $36.5 billion target for Chinese imports of US farm goods this year may not be quite out of reach, but it’s looking like a big stretch, reported Reuters.
By end-May, imports were running behind 2017 levels – rather than 50% ahead as needed – and while orders for China’s main farm import, soybeans, have started to pick up, scorching levels of buying would be needed to hit the mark.
“It just doesn’t seem likely to me,” said John Payne, senior futures & options broker with Daniels Trading in Chicago. “If the global economy was more normal then maybe, but you have this whole COVID problem.”