While commercial traders are confirming that China has bought around 10 to 12 cargoes of mostly US corn in the past month, US futures remain in a short term downtrend. The wide spread between US and China prices has encouraged Chinese buyers to seek out cheap imports. Sluggish export news, good weather in South America and energy weakness helped to pressure corn yesterday and again overnight. Year to date inspections are running 38.6% behind levels a year ago so far. The tail end of Ukraine’s corn crop is struggling to get harvested with above normal rain and snow showers over the next ten days. The weekly corn harvest report showed 95% complete compared to 90% last week and 98% last year. Weekly export inspections came in at 638,711 tonnes versus trade estimates of 500k-750k tonnes. As of November 23, cumulative corn export inspections have reached 15.4% of the USDA forecast vs. a 5-year average of 19.1%. The commitments of Traders reports as of November 21 showed non-commercial traders were net short 148,288 contracts, a decrease of 18,547 contracts for the week. Weaker crude oil, higher dollar and December first notice day long liquidation selling are short term bearish forces. Resistance is seen at 358 followed by 361. Support is at 349 and 348.5.

 

Mar ’18 Corn Daily Chart