China is apparently no longer buying U.S. soybeans amid the rise in trade tensions, Bloomberg reported Wednesday.
"Whatever they're buying is non-U.S.," Soren Schroder, CEO of New York-based Bunge, the world's largest oilseeds processor, told the news outlet in a phone interview. "They're buying beans in Canada, in Brazil, mostly Brazil, but very deliberately not buying anything from the U.S."
China canceled a net 62,690 metric tons of U.S. soybean purchases in the two weeks ended April 19, the Bloomberg article pointed out, citing USDA data for the current marketing year.
Soybean futures fell 1 percent Wednesday, but are up 8 percent on the year.
In response to the Trump administration's proposed tariffs on $50 billion worth of Chinese imports, China's Ministry of Commerce announced duties in early April on 106 U.S. products, including soybeans. No effective date was announced at the time.
China is the second-largest market for U.S. agricultural exports, and soybeans have historically been one of the top products sold to the Asian country, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture Foreign Agricultural Service.
Reference: CNBC
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