The Almond Board of California released the March Position Report on Thursday, April 10th. This is the 8th report for the 2024 crop year. Key highlights are below: 

Receipts

Receipts in February were 19.08 million lbs., down 31.6% from last March’s receipts of 27.89 million lbs. This brings total receipts for the crop year to 2.70 billion lbs., up 10.8% vs last year’s 2.44 billion lbs. Crop receipts are now trickling in and total receipts won't inch up much farther at this point. Based on March historical average receipts over the last 4 years we expect the crop to finish below 2.72 billion lbs.    

Shipments

Total shipments FTM were 221.37 million lbs., coming in above industry expectations of 215 million lbs. This shipment number is down 6.6% vs. last March’s 237.04 million lbs. Total shipments are now tracking behind the strong pace they set last year, and are now down 1.58% YTD. They will now go against an extremely strong April of 241 million lbs. shipped last year, but will have a chance to make up some ground in June and July where shipments started to fall off last year.  

Domestic shipments were 51.79 million lbs., down 17.1% vs last year’s 62.45 million lbs. Domestic shipments had their worst performance in over 2 years, this was a steep fall off especially vs. a strong March shipment month during the year prior. We will need to watch the domestic shipment number closely on the April position report to see if this was an outlier or a new domestic trend starting to show. 

Export shipments were 169.58 million lbs., which is 2.9% down vs last year’s 174.59 million lbs. Export shipments were down for the month in most of the major export regions. This was only not the case for the Japan and India markets which saw a 9% and 68% increase for the month respectively. All other major markets were down for the month. India was the star of the show this report, and is finally starting to refill their stock pipelines after a slow start to the year. India, even with this strong month of shipments, is still down 9% YTD and will likely need to continue to participate in further business, especially with them unlikely to secure significant stocks from Australia due to current Tarriff situations in China. Europe also had a weak shipment month, possibly due to the uncertainty tariffs have brought into this market. However, Europe now has some added clarity that almonds likely won’t be affected by new tariffs until December. This will drive buyers to purchase and ship almonds in order to receive them before further tariff uncertainty enters the market. China continues to see shipments fall far below last year, and this will not change in the near to medium term with trade tensions worsening between US and China over the last month. The ME region continues to slow down on shipments as they bought much heavier earlier this year, with excess stock now being drawn down, we expect this market to come back into buying mode over the next few months.   

Sales & Commitments: Total sales FTM were 217.58 million lbs., up 19.8% vs. last year’s sales of 181.67 million lbs. It was an extremely active sales month for export markets. With export shipments YTD down in most regions, and stocks on ground are currently low that these markets have no choice but to continue to buy. Domestic sales were actually down for the month as US buyers continue to buy hand to mouth due to most handlers looking to limit sales for farther out shipment windows.     

Commitments for the 2024 crop year stand at 573.63 million lbs., which is down .6% vs the 575.53 million lbs. from last year. The domestic market remains the most behind in historical commitment levels vs the export markets. We expect the domestic markets to look for more coverage post early crop estimates coming out over the next month.

Uncommitted 2024 crop inventory sits at 766 million lbs., down 1.1% vs last year’s 774.49.82 million lbs. Uncommitted inventory is now below last year’s metrics. With uncommitted inventory largely driving price gains seen at the end of the previous crop year, we expect this low level of uncommitted inventory to continue to drive price firmness in the nearby market.   

In a Nutshell: 

The March Position Report was overall another positive report for the industry. Shipments beat expectations, but the star of the show really were strong sales coupled with a lowering of uncommitted inventory. This continues to show both strong demand with dwindling available 2024 crop supply. That being said, domestic shipments are a concern, and will need to be watched closely to see if April shipments show a new trend line on consumption for the domestic market.

2024 crop year fundamentals continue to point to a firm price after this report, but outside factors such as crop estimates and tariff news can still affect pricing. With 2025 crop estimates coming out over the next month, a surprise on the high side likely won’t affect nearby pricing as much due to a lack of available inventory. However, any estimates on the low side could see pricing climb due to showing further supply tightness over the next year+. Large tariff impacts seem to be mostly avoided at this point, but as this news changes weekly it will still need to be watched closely to see how this can potentially affect demand. China is the most serious concern at this point but this market has been transitioning away for CA almonds for years now, and represented only ~5% of CA shipments last year.

Overall, this position report continues to point to strong fundamentals for 2024 crop almond supply and demand. Any large price swings at this point will likely come from 2025 crop estimates if they are outside of industry sentiment expectations of 2.6-2.8 billion lbs.

Link to Position Report