Corn ends mostly lower

Corn futures at the Chicago Board of Trade ended mostly lower Thursday, with July down 1 percent at an 8-month low, on good crop weather in the US Midwest and prospects for huge corn acreage this year in the United States, traders and analysts said.
Corn futures closed 4-1/4 cents per bushel lower to 2 higher, with July down 4-1/4 at $3.39-1/2 per bushel. New-crop December was down 3-3/4 at $3.58-1/4 per bushel. Estimated volume was 275,306 futures and 82,541 options, compared to 350,179 futures and 95,727 options traded on Wednesday.
"There was heavy liquidation going into first notice day tomorrow, and there's ideal growing weather," said Jason Roose, analyst for US Commodities in Des Moines, Iowa.
Friday is first notice day for deliveries on the July contract and traders were expecting heavy deliveries of 1,000 to 1,500 lots. Traders and analysts continued to cite the improvement this week in crop weather, especially in the dry areas of the eastern Midwest crop region.
Pockets of the eastern US Midwest received modest rains in the past day, helping relieve stress to crops, with more showers predicted to move through Thursday, a forecaster said. The weekend through early next week should be mostly dry in the eastern belt.
"Eastern Midwest crops will benefit from the recent shower activity, especially Illinois. But there's still some dry areas in Ohio," said Joel Burgio, a forecaster with DTN Meteorlogix. "Crops continue to do well in the most of the western areas, but it's dry in central Minnesota," he added. Position-squaring was noted ahead of the release early Friday of the US Agriculture Department's June plantings and quarterly stocks reports.
An average of analysts' estimates pegged 2007 US corn plantings at 90.618 million acres, up from USDA's forecast in March for 90.454 million and the largest corn area since 1944. Analysts pegged US corn stocks on June 1 at 3.456 billion bushels, below the 4.362 billion a year ago.
Fresh export news failed to give the market a lift. USDA early Thursday, in its weekly export sales report, said 989,000 tonnes of US corn were sold for export last week, above estimates for 550,000 to 850,000 tonnes. USDA also said exporters sold 220,000 tonnes of US corn to South Korea, which issued a tender early Thursday for another 110,000 tonnes of corn and 55,000 tonnes of soymeal, while Israel bought 45,000 tonnes of US corn products.
The International Grains Council on Thursday pegged global maize production at 750 million tonnes in 2007/08, slightly below the prior month's 751 million but above the 2006/07 crop of 696 million.
Cash basis bids for corn in the Midwest on Thursday were mostly unchanged at interior locations and firm on river gathering points. Cash dealers said export demand for corn was strong following the recent sharp drop of corn futures prices. Technical traders were watching the July contract trade below all key moving averages, and the nine-day relative strength index closed on Thursday at 23. Traders view an RSI of 30 or less as indicating an oversold market.