CHICAGO, July 15 (Reuters) - U.S. soybean futures fell to their lowest level in nearly four years on Monday and corn and wheat futures followed the weaker trend as rains bolstered Midwest production prospects and traders worried about demand for big crops, analysts said.
Wheat futures set life-of-contract lows while corn futures hovered just above contract lows.
On the Chicago Board of Trade, November soybeans settled down 25-1/4 cents at $10.40 per bushel after hitting $10.38-1/2, the lowest level on a continuous chart of the most-active soybean contract since October 2020.
CBOT September wheat ended down 18-1/4 cents at $5.32-1/2 a bushel after setting a contract low at $5.31. December corn finished down 10-1/2 cents at $4.04-1/4.
Analysts believe that U.S. crops benefited last week from the remnants of Hurricane Beryl, which brought showers to dry areas of the eastern Midwest crop belt. More rain fell over the weekend, and forecasts called for milder temperatures this week after a spell of hot weather.
"The rainfall in the north-central Midwest over-performed expectations from Friday and favored corn and soybeans," satellite technology company Maxar said in a daily note.
After the markets closed, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) rated 68% of the U.S. corn and soybean crops in good to excellent condition, unchanged from the previous week. The ratings fell short of analyst expectations for a slight improvement, but were still the highest for this time of year for both crops since 2020.
Soybeans faced additional pressure from a smaller-than-expected U.S. crushing pace in June. The National Oilseed Processors Association (NOPA) said its members processed 175.599 million bushels of soybeans last month, below most trade estimates.
Some analysts attributed declines in the CBOT soy complex on a greater chance that presidential candidate Donald Trump will win a second term after surviving an assassination attempt. A second Trump term could signal trade tensions with China, the world's top soy buyer.
"The assassination attempt on Trump on the weekend, that gave him a better chance of him winning the election, and that has some people like the Chinese maybe concerned about tariffs," said Dan Basse, president of AgResource Co.
Wheat was pressured by the ongoing Northern Hemisphere winter wheat harvest and prospects of sizable crops in top exporter Russia and the United States. Russia's IKAR agricultural consultancy raised its forecast for the country's wheat crop to 83.2 million metric tons, from 82 million tons previously.
The USDA on Friday raised its projection of the U.S. 2024 wheat harvest to 2.008 billion bushels, topping a range of analysts' expectations. (Reporting by Julie Ingwersen; additional reporting by Michael Hogan in Hamburg and Naveen Thukral in Singapore; Editing by Leslie Adler and Stephen Coates)
