* CBOT March corn settled up 3-1/4 cents at $3.83 per bushel, after reaching $3.83-1/2, its highest since Dec. 19.
* The corn market was bolstered by US soybean futures, which climbed to a two-week high in mid-day trading on optimism over US-China trade talks planned for next week, coupled with declining estimates of the size of Brazil's developing crop.
* Stock and commodity markets rallied after Beijing announced a new round of negotiations with Washington on Jan. 7-8, bolstering hopes of a resolution to a tariff war that has clouded the global economic outlook.
* US President Donald Trump said on Friday that talks between Washington and Beijing aimed at resolving a bitter trade dispute were going "very well."
* Questions over South American weather also made the corn market just a tiny bit bullish on Friday, traders said.
* INTL FCStone, an agribusiness consultancy, on Friday revised its Brazil first corn crop forecast in the 2018/2019 season at 27.13 million tonnes, in January, versus its 27.27 million tonnes in its December forecast.
* But concerns over ethanol profitability, and the risk of the partial federal government shutdown delaying the roll-out of allowing higher levels of ethanol in gasoline during summer months, kept a bit of a ceiling on corn prices Friday, traders said.
* The US Energy Information Administration said on Friday that weekly US output of corn-based ethanol fell to 1.01 million barrels per day, and stocks of the biofuel rose to 23.16 million barrels.