December wheat opened 25 1/2 cents higher on the day at 925 and established an early range of 913 to 959 1/2. Wheat rallied sharply along with corn and the soybean complex after a higher open this morning. Traders noted that opening calls got increasingly higher closer to the open due to the sharp drop in the dollar and corresponding rally in crude oil. This brought a rush of buy orders from commission houses and funds with sellers described as "very scarce" by one trader. Positive sentiment was also said to come from another very strong export sales number this in wheat week. Net sales for wheat came in at 916,500 tonnes for the current marketing year and 15,000 for next year for a total of 931,500. Cumulative wheat sales for 2008/2009 have reached 52.2% of the USDA forecast versus a 5 year average of 37.0%. Sales of 314,000 tonnes are needed each week to reach the USDA forecast. Sales were very heavily weighted toward hard red wheat with Iran the biggest buyer there at 786,900 tonnes. On the inflation front, the USDA said that food prices will jump 5% to 6% this year. This would be the biggest increase since 1990. A number of news sources are commenting today on the latest large purchase of US wheat by Iran, their first purchase from the US in 27 years. Traders and analysts are pointing out that this is coming due to the increasingly tight outlook for high quality milling wheat due to the much lower than normal percentages of milling wheat seen for crops in the Black Sea region. Basis levels at the Gulf have failed to rally from their historically low levels along with the rally in futures according to cash market sources. Over the past two weeks, soft red basis levels at the Gulf have declined by some 25 cents.