According to Cofeed, in the week as of Mar 12, details of soybean oil inventories and outstanding contracts in main domestic regions are as follows:

Some mills are in a lack of beans due to small soybean cargoes arriving at ports in February and March and some are facing swelling meal inventory (especially in Guangdong and Liaoning provinces), so operation rates fall as expected in China this week (Mar 6-12). Soybean crush at domestic mills totals 1,448,700 tonnes (meal 1,144,473 tonnes and oil 275,253 tonnes), down 232,800 tonnes or 13.84% from 1,681,500 tonnes last week. Meanwhile, operation rates (capacity utilization) are 40.85%, down 6.57% from 47.42% in the previous week. Soybean crush is expected to pick up slightly in the coming two weeks but still stay at a low level, to 1.50 mln tonnes next week and to 1.52 mln tonnes in week 12.

Soybean oil stocks continue a decline sharply this week, as soyoil output reduces with a decline in the crush and mid-and-downstream buyers are taking delivery at a brisk pace. In the week ending Mar 12, China’s soybean oil commercial inventories total 748,250 tonnes, down 82,400 tonnes by 9.92% from 830,650 tonnes last week, down 110,550 tonnes by 12.87% from 858,800 tonnes month on month, and down 651,300 tonnes by 46.54% from 1,399,550 tonnes year on year. And the five-year (2016-2020) average at the same period is 1,180,500 tonnes.

Fig.: China’s Soybean Oil Stocks in Recent Years