Corn Drops into the Weekend

The Friday corn markets ended near their lows for the day on 1.5% to 1.8% losses. March corn futures achieved a $6.50 pin with option expiration, with over 12k puts and nearly 7k calls of 650 strike OI as of the previous day (2/23) settle. For the week, March was down 27 3/4 cents and Dec was 19 1/2 cents lower. The average Feb close for Dec corn was running at $5.94 with two closes left in the insurance pricing period. 

After the ION hacking delays, CFTC released Commitment of Traders data as of the 1/31 settlement – nearly a month old. At the time, managed money was 219,924 contracts net long and the commercials were 417,093 contracts net short in corn. 

USDA’s FAS reported a 20% drop in weekly corn bookings with the first sub-1 MMT booking in 4 weeks. The Export Sales report had 823k MT of sales, which was within the range of estimates, as Japan bought 312k MT (including 137k MT switched from unknown) and Mexico booked 290k MT. The old crop book sat at 28.7 MMT (1.128 bbu), which is down 40% yr/yr and includes 14.36 MMT of shipments and 14.28 MMT of outstanding sales. For new crop corn, there is 1.563 MMT on the books as of 2/16. 

StoneX expects Brazil’s 2023 ethanol output to increase 5.4% citing a better sugar crop and the need for domestic production following tariff implementation on U.S. ethanol. 

AgRural showed that over half of Brazil’s 2nd crop corn has missed the “ideal planting window” as 18.2% of Parana fields (down from 22.8% average), and 6.1% of Mato Grosso do Sul fields (17.3% ave) were planted as of 2/23. BAGE lowered their estimate for Argentina’s corn crop by 3.5 MMT to 41 MMT. 

Mar 23 Corn  closed at $6.50, down 10 1/4 cents,

Nearby Cash   was $6.49 1/4, down 11 7/8 cents,

May 23 Corn  closed at $6.49 1/4, down 10 cents,

Jul 23 Corn  closed at $6.38 3/4, down 12 cents,