December 18, 2007

 

CBOT Corn Review on Monday: Finishes little changed in two-sided trade

 

 

Chicago Board of Trade corn futures settled unchanged to fractionally higher Monday, recovering from thin losses in a quiet, holiday-type trade, an analyst said.

 

March corn settled 1/2 cent higher at US$4.38 3/4 per bushel.

 

Follow-through strength helped supply support at the opening as did a rally in wheat futures to new all-time highs. March corn did set a new life-of-contract high in overnight electronic trading but couldn't approach that level in day session activity, the analyst said.

 

The absence of active speculative buying interest and a retreat in wheat futures along with profit-taking kept corn lower for much of the day, a commission house analyst said.

 

Thin fund selling also limited the upside, the commission house analyst said. Fund selling was estimated at 2,000 contracts.

 

Slightly better-than-expected export inspections had little impact.

 

The U.S. Department of Agriculture reported that corn inspected for export totaled 46.589 million bushels for the week ended Dec. 13, slightly above the 40-45 million bushels expected by analysts, and above the 42.630 million inspected last week.

 

Trading activity was thin compared to recent sessions, with some participants exiting out of positions ahead of the holidays and the new year, an e-cbot trader said.

 

Light short-covering and modest corn-wheat spreading helped corn stage a modest rebound near the close, but there wasn't much interest in buying corn, the commission house analyst said.

 

On daily technical charts, electronically traded March corn remained above its major moving averages with its 14-day relative strength index at 78.19.

 

In options trading, MF Global bought 5,000 February US$4.10 puts and sold 5,000 March US$3.60 puts.

 

Oat futures settled with thin gains as light speculative buying provided support to prices, an analyst said.

 

March oats finished 1 1/2 cents higher at US$2.99 1/4 cents per bushel.

 

Ethanol futures ended higher. January ethanol rose 2.9 cents to US$2.11 per gallon and February gained 2 cents to US$2.06.