April 18, 2006

 

CBOT Corn Review on Monday: Ends mixed, unable to hold early gains

 

 

Corn futures at the Chicago Board of Trade ended Monday with some fractional gains, unable to sustain opening level advances because of concerns about planting delays in the U.S. corn belt, stronger prices in overnight trade, and higher outside markets, sources said.

 

May corn rose 1/4 cent to US$2.36 1/2 per bushel, July slipped 1/4 cent to US$2.48 1/4, and December settled 3/4 cent higher at US$2.69 1/4.

 

The notion that weekend rainfall was greater than had been expected and forecasts calling for more rain later this week led to concerns about planting delays, sources said.

 

The weather worries, fund buying and higher outside markets prompted the early buying interest, a floor trader said.

 

Fund and technical buying also helped push prices higher, sources added.

 

However, a lack of follow-through fund buying and local selling helped trim lower wheat futures' gains and the inability of soybean futures to maintain earlier double-digit gains aided the selling, floor sources said.

 

Futures were overdone on the upside this morning, and corn spent the rest of the day correcting it, the floor trader noted.

 

Showers and thundershowers are expected to drop .25-1.00 inch across much of the western U.S. Midwest on Tuesday and Wednesday, except for in the Dakotas and northern Minnesota, which could see .50-1.50 inches, DTN Meteorlogix Weather said.

 

In the eastern U.S. Midwest, light rain or drizzle is expected to linger over parts of the region Monday with mainly dry weather returning on Tuesday. There is a chance for light showers on Wednesday with temperatures averaging above normal Tuesday and near normal north and above normal south on Wednesday, DTN Meteorlogix Weather said.

 

The U.S. Department of Agriculture reported that corn inspected for export totaled 29.179 million bushels, below the 32-37 million bushels inspected and beneath last week's 35.928 million bushels inspected for export.

 

Buyers Monday included RJ O'Brien, with 1,700 May; the Refco division of Man Financial, with 1,000 July; Fimat, with 600 May; Citigroup, with 500 July; JP Morgan, with 500 May and 500 July; and the USA Trading division of Man Financial, with 500 May.

 

Sellers Monday included JP Morgan, with 700 May, 300 December, and 100 July; ADM, with 200 July; Man Financial, with 200 May; the Refco division of Man Financial, with 700 May; and FC Stonnee, with 200 December.

 

In spread trading, Tenco spread 5,500 May-July, and Fimat spread 4,000 July-May.

 

Commodity fund buying was estimated at a net 5,000 contracts.

 

Oat futures settled higher as light fund buying provided support for prices early in the session, a commission house analyst said. May oats rose 2 1/4 cents at US$1.74 3/4 per bushel, and July gained 2 1/4 cents at US$1.79 3/4.

 

Ethanol futures ended mostly higher. The May contract didn't trade and settled 1 1/2 cents higher at US$2.72 1/2 per gallon. June rose 2 cents to US$2.71, and July gained 2 cents to US$2.72.

 

Monday afternoon, the USDA is scheduled to release the weekly crop progress report at 3:00 p.m. CDT (2000 GMT).