The latest Market Talks covering Commodities. Published exclusively on Dow Jones Newswires throughout the day.

1534 ET - Live cattle futures on the CME closed the day up 0.7% at $2.14025 a pound. Buoying cattle ahead of the Independence Day holiday are rumors about a potential U.S.-China trade deal. If such an agreement is around the corner U.S. beef is expected to be a big beneficiary of reopened trade relations. "If we are on the verge of some Chinese trade deal, as was rumored yesterday, we should probably expect cattle futures to appreciate that as well," StoneX says in a note. Lean hog futures finished the day down 1.7% to $1.0605 a pound. (kirk.maltais@wsj.com)

1528 ET - Crude futures settle lower in quiet, range-bound trade ahead of the U.S. holiday weekend. After yesterday's rally on renewed Middle East geopolitical risk premium, the market was restrained by the widely held view that OPEC+ will agree to bring back another 411,000 barrels a day in August. Analysts at Citi expect the group may elect to pause production unwinds until after August as summer demand eases and non-OPEC+ supply accelerates. "Still, the recent sharp swings in oil prices suggest financial positioning should have returned to neutral levels, which could offer room for a limited and brief sell-off on OPEC+ headlines of another 411,000 b/d quota unwind," they say in a note. WTI settles down 0.7% at $67.00 a barrel, and Brent slips 0.4% to $68.80. (anthony.harrup@wsj.com)

1503 ET - U.S. natural gas futures fall going into the long weekend with its risks of shifts in weather forecasts that could alter demand expectations. "The weather data is decently hot for most of the next 15 days but with much of the heat focused over the western half of the U.S.," NatGasWeather.com says in a note. Among weather risks is a low-pressure system off Florida likely to bring cooling showers up the mid-Atlantic Coast, the forecaster adds. The 55 Bcf weekly storage build reported by the EIA was slightly above expectations and slightly below average, prompting a loss of early upward price momentum. Nymex natural gas settles down 2.3% at $3.409/mmBtu. (anthony.harrup@wsj.com)

1434 ET - Gold's weekly gain breaks a two-week losing streak, with the contract finishing the week up 1.8% to $3,331.60 a troy ounce--which includes a loss of 0.5% on the day. "The trend in gold is unquestionably favoured to the upside, with the latest selloff likely to be viewed as a dip-buying opportunity amid a cautious Fed and the decline in U.S. Treasury yields since late May," says Aaron Hill of FP Markets. Some traders expect gold to climb to as much as $4,000 an ounce. (kirk.maltais@wsj.com)

1418 ET - President Trump is scheduled to speak at the Iowa State Fair tonight. Grain traders are placing their bets on what he might announce during the speech. "The bulls argue that Trump would not head to the heart of America to start the Independence Day celebration if he was not going to announce something substantial," AgResource says in a note. The firm adds that instituting a nationwide ethanol blending standard of E15 is also a possibility for tonight. Most-active corn is up 0.5% and soybeans are up 0.1% late in the session, while wheat is down 1.2%. (kirk.maltais@wsj.com)

1327 ET - The number of rigs drilling for oil in the U.S. fell by seven this week to 425 and was down by 54 from a year ago, oil services company Baker Hughes reports. Natural gas rigs slipped by one to 108, or seven more than a year ago. In the Dallas Fed's second-quarter survey of energy companies in Texas, northern Louisiana and southern New Mexico, almost half of the executives said they expect to drill fewer wells this year than they had planned at the start of 2025. If oil were to hold at $60 a barrel, 61% of companies said they would expect a small decrease in their firms' oil production over the next year. At $50 a barrel, 46% of firms would expect a significant drop. (anthony.harrup@wsj.com)

1303 ET - The outlook for U.S. crop-growing areas is for temperatures to turn milder. Regular rainfall is expected to make a return to many growing areas within the next 4-5 days, says Daniel Flynn of Price Futures Group in a note. "If current 10-day forecasts verifies, the time for weather adversity to impact corn during key reproductive stages shrinks rapidly, and it remains that mid-summer will be marked by a quick-moving jet stream and lack of pattern stagnation," Flynn says. CBOT corn is up 1%, while soybeans are up 0.4%. Wheat, meanwhile, is down 0.2%. (kirk.maltais@wsj.com)

1215 ET - Oil futures give back some of yesterday's gains ahead of the long U.S. weekend. Limiting enthusiasm is Sunday's planned OPEC+ meeting where members are expected to agree on the return of another 411,000 barrels a day of voluntary output cuts. Traders are also digesting yesterday's EIA inventory report that showed an unexpected 3.8 million barrel crude stock build, and remain wary about next week's U.S. tariff deadline. On the positive side, U.S. June payrolls were better than expected and the unemployment rate fell, although resulting dollar gains could limit crude upside. WTI is off 0.9% at $66.84 a barrel, and Brent is down 0.7% at $68.60. (anthony.harrup@wsj.com)

1205 ET - Gold futures fall following stronger-than-expected U.S. Nonfarm Payroll data. Futures are down 0.6% at $3,338.30 a troy ounce. The report showed 147,000 new jobs added in June, compared with 110,000 expected, alongside a decline in the unemployment rate. The much-stronger figure means a July interest rate cut should no longer be in consideration by the Federal Reserve, StoneX's Fawad Razaqzada says in a note. This has dented the appeal of non-interest bearing bullion. The report has boosted risk-on sentiment and the U.S. dollar, further weighing on gold's safe-haven aspects, Razaqzada says. Still, the data also points to lower wage gains and the composition of job additions--heavily tilted towards government hiring--mean the report is less inflationary than it appears at first glance, complicating the Fed's calculus, Razaqzada adds. (joseph.hoppe@wsj.com)

1130 ET - Russian oil shipments from the Arctic to Syria have surged past 6 million barrels so far this year, according to Kpler. The data provider's tracking indicates another delivery of Russian Arctic-origin crude at Syria's Baniyas port around June 28, marking the seventh cargo delivered in 2025. This follows the suspension of Iranian oil shipments after the collapse of President Bashar al-Assad's regime in late 2024, according to the firm. "While the U.S. has lifted most economic sanctions on Syria, the country has yet to import crude from any producers other than Russia," says Ying Cong Loh, market analyst at Kpler. (giulia.petroni@wsj.com)

1122 ET - While Canada's goods-trade deficit with the world narrowed in May, the country's energy surplus narrowed to the lowest level in nearly four years, National Bank of Canada's Jocelyn Paquet notes. That was partly due to continued soft oil prices for the month, but also to a decline in export volumes, the economist says. Energy volumes have now fallen 9.2% since December, the largest five-month drop since the height of the Covid-19 pandemic. (robb.stewart@wsj.com; @RobbMStewart)

1122 ET - Saudi Arabia's crude exports climbed to their highest level in more than two years last month, as the kingdom shipped significant volumes to overseas storage facilities amid heightened supply disruption risks in the region, Kpler data shows. June crude exports rose to 6.4 million barrels a day--8.5% above the p8revious month and the highest since June 2023. "The increase reflects strategic measures to maintain supply stability amid heightened regional tensions, including pre-positioning vessels and reallocating cargoes, rather than a surge in demand or sales," says Fred Asiedu, market analyst at Kpler. "Saudi Arabia quickly acted to demonstrate it remained a steady, reliable supplier." (giulia.petroni@wsj.com)

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

July 03, 2025 16:15 ET (20:15 GMT)

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