CHICAGO: Chicago Board of Trade corn futures closed lower Friday in the face of a firmer dollar, lower equities on concerns about a slowing economy in China, and crop-nourishing rain in the US
* Signs of slow economic growth in China were noted. China's GDP growth in the first quarter slowed to 8.1 percent from 8.9 percent in the previous three months.
* Corn export premiums at the US Gulf Coast were higher late Thursday on robust export demand and tight old-crop supplies, cash merchants said.
* Wet weather will blanket most of the US Midwest by the weekend into early next week, which will delay early corn plantings but also add valuable soil moisture. "There is a good chance most of the Midwest will receive 1 to 2 inches of rain over the next 5 days and there is more rain expected at the end of next week, so there won't be much fieldwork done," said John Dee, meteorologist for Global Weather Monitoring.
* Dee said the cold snap this week that dropped temperatures below freezing may have harmed some early planted corn and some of the more mature wheat crop. "There wasn't any widespread disaster but some farmers that planted corn really early may have some burned back, but it usually recovers pretty quickly," Dee said. Dee said the coldest weather next week would be confined to the northern Midwest, which is normal for this time of year.
* China's corn acreage this year is projected to rise 2.7 percent from 2011 to reach 35 million hectares, driven by record domestic prices and Beijing's subsidies, an industry website quoted an agriculture ministry survey as saying.
* May was below all key moving averages and the nine-day RSI was at 39.
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