Brazil Sends Cheap Soy Oil Abroad as Biodiesel Plan Stalls

The world’s top soybean producer Brazil is processing record amounts of the crop, but a delay in the country’s plans to boost local demand through biofuel mandates has resulted in an excess of cheap soy oil supplies being shipped overseas.

While soy oil futures in Chicago have climbed almost 56% this year, prices in Brazilian ports have moved much slower. A discount for soy oil in Brazil’s key port of Paranaguá is now the widest since 2023, according to data by Commodity3. The low cost has helped push Brazil’s soy oil exports up 47% this year through April, to the second highest volume for the period in the past two decades.