CHICAGO: US wheat futures firmed on Wednesday, bucking an overall downward trend across the grains markets, on a round of technical buying, traders said.

* The benchmark Chicago Board of Trade September soft red winter wheat contract found support at the low end of its 20-day Bollinger range.

* Declines in the corn market limited the strength in wheat futures.

* Analysts were expecting a weekly US Agriculture Department report on Thursday morning to show that total export sales of wheat were in a range between 200,000 tonnes and 500,000 tonnes. A week ago, wheat export sales were 487,672 tonnes.