URBANA, Ill. – Independent news sources and traders reported on Nov. 17 that China had purchased nearly 1 million metric tons of U.S. soybeans. If confirmed, it would be China’s largest U.S. soybean purchase since at least January and the most significant since the Oct. 30 summit in Busan, South Korea, between President Donald Trump and President Xi Jinping. 

“China is buying U.S. soybeans to meet the pledges it made to Washington…even though the cargoes are priced higher than rival Brazilian offers, two Asia-based traders said,” Reuters News reported. “‘This bigger round of U.S. soybean buying is no longer a goodwill gesture but a manifestation of China’s commitment to the Busan terms,’ said a Singapore-based trader.”

The Reuters report stated that “China’s state-owned grain trader COFCO bought at least 840,000 metric tons for shipment in December and January, the two traders with knowledge of the deals told Reuters. Eight of the vessels were for shipment in December and January from U.S. Gulf Coast terminals, while the rest were for shipment in January from Pacific Northwest ports, one trader said. A second trader estimated around 75 percent of the sales were for Gulf shipment, with the remainder from the Pacific Northwest ports.”

Bloomberg further reported that “the purchases have reignited market optimism around the soybean trade between the two agricultural powerhouses, which was worth more than $12 billion last year and will underpin any trade agreement.”

Though China has yet to confirm the specific purchase commitments, it has moved to reduce tariffs on the crop and lifted import bans on three American exporters, including CHS Inc., reciprocating similar conciliatory actions from the U.S., according to the news service.

“We haven’t even finished the agreement, which we hope to have done by Thanksgiving,” Bessent said in an interview with Fox News’ Sunday Morning Futures.

A recent article published by the Purdue University Center for Commercial Agriculture examines how the current proposed deal compares to previous U.S. export levels to China, and how it could impact the global soybean market in the years to come. The article, “U.S.-China Soybean Deal: Comparing Past Export Levels and Global Market Impacts”  (Colussi, J. and M. Langemeier), revealed that if China fulfills their reported 12-million-ton purchase commitment in the last two months of the year, U.S. soybean exports to the Chinese market in 2025 would total around 18 million metric tons – 33 percent lower than in 2024, when exports to China reached 26.8 million metric tons.

“The announcement that China would resume purchases from the United States supported soybean futures, which had moved slightly higher in recent days, reaching almost $11 per bushel – the highest level in over a year. Still, after the $11 per bushel futures price is adjusted for basis, the resulting cash price is still below the break-even point for many U.S. soybean producers in 2025,” Langemeier and Colussi stated.

Meanwhile, Brazil’s strong export performance in 2025 means the competitive landscape has become more crowded, with Chinese buyers attracted to South America’s lower transaction fees and tariffs. American shipments of U.S. soybeans to China still face a 13 percent retaliatory tariff, maintaining the competitiveness of South American soybeans in the global market.

“In recent months, Brazil and Argentina have reached record export volumes to China. Despite the recent reduction in Chinese tariffs on U.S agricultural products, South America is expected to maintain a strong position in the global soybean trade. Brazil’s expanded planted area projected for the 2025/26 crop season and the prospect of a trend-yield crop in Argentina further reinforce this competitive outlook,” according to the Purdue report authors.

The deal came just three days after USDA released its first agricultural data in more than 43 days following the government shutdown, which created serious doubts about whether China would follow through on its Busan promise.

“The USDA report released after the government reopened showed only two Chinese purchases of American soybeans since the summit in South Korea that totaled 332,000 metric tons,” the Associated Press reported just hours before news of the deal was made on Nov. 17. “That’s well short of the 12 million metric tons that Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins said China agreed to purchase by January and nowhere near the 25 million metric tons she said they would buy in each of the next three years.”

Agri-Pulse reported on Nov. 17 that “a Commerce Ministry spokesperson refused to confirm that Chinese purchase commitments of U.S. soybeans were part of a trade deal agreed to late last month…a reporter asked He Yadong to confirm the White House’s insistence that China will buy 12 million tons of soybeans this year and 25 million annually after that. But he demurred.”

Neither the USDA nor the Treasury Department had issued statements regarding the purported 1 million ton Chinese soybean purchase by Farm World press time.