The corn market finished off the week of losses with bears taking some money off the table. Contracts were up 2 to 4 cents across most months, with July falling 19 ¼ cents (4.10%) this week and December down 8 ¼ cents. The nearby CmdtyView national average Cash Corn price was up 2 1/4 cents at $4.20 1/4. 

USDA reported a private export sale of 288,000 MT of corn to Mexico this morning, with 95,100 MT for 2024/25 and 192,900 MT for 2025/26.

Speculators in corn futures and options were cutting back a total of 57,436 contracts from their net long in corn futures and options as of May 6. That net long stood at just 13,893 contracts as of Tuesday, the lowest since early November. 

Export Sales data from Thursday took the total export commitments for US corn to 60.411 MMT, which is 27% larger than last year and exceeds the full year total for each of the last 3 years. That is also now 93% of the current USDA forecast, with sales normally 95%.

Ahead of Monday’s WASDE report, analysts expect to see Argentina corn production down 0.25 MMT from last month at 49.75 MMT. Brazil’s output is expected to rise by ~1 MMT to 126.96 MMT on average. World ending stocks are estimated to be down slightly to 287.65 MMT for old crop, with new crop at 297.36 MMT.

May 25 Corn  closed at $4.41 1/2, up 2 1/2 cents,

Nearby Cash  was $4.20 1/4, up 2 1/4 cents,

Jul 25 Corn  closed at $4.49 3/4, up 2 1/4 cents,

Dec 25 Corn  closed at $4.42, up 3 1/4 cents,

New Crop Cash  was $4.00 3/4, up 3 cents,