The U.S. soybean crush likely hit 6.185 million short tons in December 2023, or 296.1 million bushels, the most for any month in recorded history.
Analysts surveyed ahead of the monthly USDA report noted it would be the third straight month that the national soybean crush topped 200 million bushels as the expanding U.S. soy processing industry has been crushing larger and larger numbers of beans to meet the rising demand for vegetable oil from biofuel makers. If that December estimate gets realized, it would be up from the 200.1 million bushels crushed in November and up 10 percent from the December 2022 crush of 187.4 million bushels.
But other reports say last month’s estimated average daily crush rate of 6.649 million bushels would be down from a record daily pace of 6.669 million set in November, which has one less day. Crush estimates range from 203.8 million to 207 million bushels.
