Corn Futures Up into Friday

Corn futures are back up by 2 to 5 cents into the weekly Export Sales report. Corn futures were ultimately near mid-ranged at their close on Thursday. March futures tried to recover overnight, leading briefly to 4c gains, and was down 5c at the day’s low. March settled down a penny, in the red for the 5th consecutive session and a net 30 cents. New crop futures were weaker with 3 to 3 1/2 cent losses on Thursday. Preliminary open interest showed more long liquidation, dropping 3,438 contracts. 

Census data confirmed 2.427 MMT, or 95.55 mbu, of corn was exported during the month of November. That was up 17% from October, but only about half of the same month last year. MYTD shipments for the Q1 reached 280.9 mbu – 13.5% of the USDA full year forecast. Census also had 728k MT of DDGS exports and 81.441m gallons of ethanol during November. 

Going into the weekly Export Sales report traders are looking for corn bookings to come in between 400k MT and 1 MMT from the week that ended 12/29. New crop sales are estimated below 200k MT for the week. 

EIA data showed weekly ethanol production averaged 844k barrels per day during the week that ended 12/30. That was a weekly decline of 119k barrels per day. Stocks were down by 192k barrels to 24.444 million. 

Data from the Argentine Ag Ministry had farmer sales for old crop corn (21/22) at 75.7% as of 1/4. That is near last year’s selling pace.  Yearly export data from Brazil showed the 2022 corn shipments totaled 43.17 MMT, compared to 20.6 MMT from 2021. 

Mar 23 Corn  closed at $6.52 3/4, down 1 cent, currently up 5 cents

Nearby Cash   was $6.55 1/2, down 1/2 cent,

May 23 Corn  closed at $6.52 1/2, down 1 1/2 cents, currently up 4 1/2 cents

Jul 23 Corn  closed at $6.46 3/4, down 2 1/2 cents, currently up 3 3/4 cents