December 15, 2009

 

CBOT Corn Review on Monday: Extends uptrend on technical buying, outlook

 

 

Corn futures on the Chicago Board of Trade ended higher Monday, extending the previous week's gains on technical buying and bullish long-range fundamental outlooks.

 

December corn ended up 2 3/4 cents at US$3.92 a bushel, and March corn ended 4 cents higher at US$4.08 1/2 a bushel. Speculative fund buying was estimated at 5,000 lots.

 

The market continued its upward move, finding support from Friday's push above layers of technical resistance.

 

"The fundamental justification for the technical rally is the need to buy acres for next year," said John Kleist, broker/analyst with Allendale Inc.

 

There is growing speculation in the market that corn will need to push prices in an effort gain additional acres as well as provide an incentive to promote improved seed genetics to produce higher yields.

 

Additional support was generated from weakness in the U.S. dollar, spillover support from soy and wheat futures and concerns about poor quality crops, as over a half a billion bushels are estimated to remain in wet, snow covered Midwest fields.

 

T-storm Weather said a major snowstorm will not affect corn areas over the next week. Temperatures will become much milder during the middle of the week across these areas, but turn substantially colder this weekend. The center of the coldest weather focuses on the central and eastern corn belt.

 

Private exporters reported to the U.S. Department of Agriculture export sales of 116,000 metric tonnes of corn for delivery to unknown destinations so far during the 2009/2010 marketing year, USDA said Monday.

 

USDA will release updated harvest progress reports at 4 p.m. EST Monday. Analysts contacted by Dow Jones Newswires anticipate harvest progress in a range of 90% to 95% complete.

 

CBOT oat futures ended lower. December oats slipped 1/2 cent to US$2.47 1/2 a bushel, and March oats finished 1/4 cent lower at US$2.58 3/4.

 

Ethanol futures ended lower. January ethanol finished 3.2 cents down at US$1.88 a gallon, and March ethanol down 2.2 cents at US$1.81.