Chinese state owned grain trader COFCO has inquired about potential purchases of US wheat, its first such inquiry since the September meeting between Presidents Trump and Xi, Bloomberg reported. The interest is in US soft red winter wheat for shipment in early 2027. Following the summit, both sides announced plans to reduce tariffs on several agricultural commodities including wheat, corn and sorghum, and China committed to purchasing at least 17 billion dollars of US agricultural products annually through 2028 on the US account of the agreements.
Nothing has been bought yet in the grains that matter most for volume. According to Bloomberg, the US has not recorded any wheat or corn sales to China since the start of the current marketing year. The buying that has happened is soybeans: Reuters reported on October 26 that Chinese state buyers had pushed cumulative commitments for the 2026 to 27 marketing year to roughly 15 million tonnes, against a 25 million tonne annual target the White House says Beijing agreed to and Beijing itself has not publicly confirmed, with ordinary commercial buyers largely sidelined by a combined tariff of about 13 percent on US soybeans.
Corn shows why an inquiry should not be read as a reopening. A COFCO Futures research director quoted by Reuters said US corn is not an option yet for Chinese buyers, because even at the preferential in quota tariff the delivered import margin for November to March shipment runs at a loss of roughly 15.5 to 60 yuan a tonne. China’s own wheat supplies are also ample after another bumper harvest, and its 2027 tariff rate import quotas for wheat, corn, rice and cotton were set unchanged from this year on October 19.
The market took the inquiry as a signal anyway. Wheat rose above 6.05 dollars a bushel after touching a 16 week low of 5.99 dollars on October 28, and the site market tables put wheat at 607.8 cents, up 0.66 percent on the day and down 2.76 percent on the week. USDA export sales data in the same window showed a strong wheat week of 849,800 tonnes led by the Philippines, with China absent from the buyers’ list, which is the gap the inquiry would have to close to matter.