August 5, 2006

 

CBOT Corn Review on Friday: Ends little changed in quiet trade

 

 

Chicago Board of Trade corn futures ended little changed Friday as the market was unable to generate any upside momentum after a stronger start based off of higher overnight prices on supportive weather forecasts, sources said.

 

September corn ended unchanged at US$2.45 per bushel and the December contract settled up 1/4 cent at US$2.62 1/4.

 

The market added in some premium ahead of the weekend early on based off the overnight forecasts, but December was unable to remain above its 50-day moving average of US$2.65 1/2, and futures drifted lower, a commission house analyst said.

 

There was no e-CBOT day session trade until midday as technical problems prevented it from opening.

 

Midday weather forecasts were little changed from earlier predictions. There was nothing dramatically different in the midday forecast from earlier outlooks, said Mike Palmerino, meteorologist with DTN Meteorologix Weather. There remains a chance for some scattered light showers and thunderstorms mostly in the western U.S. corn belt Sunday. "Going into the mid-to-latter part of next week there will be some scattered thundershowers around but on any given day, most of the corn belt will be dry," he said.

 

News that Informa Economics estimated the U.S. corn crop at 10.857 billion bushels with a yield of 150.8 bushels per acre had little impact as it was seen near FC Stonnee's estimate earlier in the week, sources said.

 

Corn is waiting on the crop conditions report on Monday and then the big U.S. Department of Agriculture report next Friday, the commission house broker said.

 

On technical charts, December traded an outside day with a higher high and a lower low than Thursday's session. December finished above its 40-day moving average but below its 50-day moving average.

 

Buyers Friday included FC Stonnee, which bought 1,000 December, Rosenthal bought 1,000 September, UBS bought 1,000 December and Rand Financial bought 600 December.

 

Sellers Friday included RJ O'Brien, which sold 2,000 December, O'Connor sold 1,500 December, JP Morgan sold 1,000 December, and 800 December 2007, and FC Stonnee sold 800 December 2007.

 

Overall fund buying was estimated at 400 contracts.

 

Oat futures ended lower as light speculative selling weighed on the market, sources said.

 

September oats fell 3 1/2 cents to US$1.84 1/2 per bushel while December contract slipped 1/4 cent to US$1.93 1/2.

 

Ethanol futures finished mixed in very light trade. August ethanol rose 1 cent to US$2.56 cents per gallon and September slipped 2 cents higher to US$2.53.

 

Friday afternoon the Commodity Futures Trading Commission is scheduled to release the latest commitment of trader's report.

 

On Monday, the U.S. Department of Agriculture is scheduled to release the weekly export inspections at 10:00 a.m. CDT and the weekly crop progress report at 3:00 p.m. CDT (2000 GMT).