Koch Nitrogen sent out an alert April 3 that it has suspended UAN truck loading at Beatrice, Neb., until further notice. No other details were available.
In the meantime, sources say the nitrogen market has quickly reacted to USDA’s projection report of March 30 that farmers intend to plant approximately 96 million acres of corn.
Effective April 4, Koch reposted urea at $690/st FOB Enid, Okla., up $75/st from its March 24 list price, and a full $95/st higher than Koch’s March 22 reference price at Enid.
Effective March 30, Agrium reposted its granular urea prices in California at $650/st FOB West Sacramento; $660/st FOB Hanford and Richvale; $685/st truck-DEL in Central California; $695/st truck-DEL in the Northern California counties of Del Norte, Humboldt, Lassen, Modoc, Shasta, Siskiyou and Trinity; and $705/st truck-DEL in Imperial, Orange, Riverside and San Diego counties.
Agrium also moved up its delivered UAN postings on April 4 in Montana and Wyoming, firming to $440/st DEL ($13.75/unit) for UAN-32 and $385/st ($13.75/unit) DEL for UAN-28.
Some worried that there might be price run ups in line with or greater than those occurring in 2008-2009 with these occurring during the middle of the fertilizer season. Early reports were that urea barges at NOLA quickly hit $650/st FOB and above early in the week with sellers now quoting $700/st FOB.
In the meantime, at least one analyst said major U.S. nitrogen maker CF Industries Holdings Inc. is set to “make a killing” off of the current scenario.