Chicago Board of Trade corn futures ended lower on Friday on position-squaring ahead of the weekend and the US Department of Agriculture's March 31 US planting intentions and quarterly stocks reports, traders said.
Expectations of a drop in corn demand from the ethanol sector added pressure as depressed profit margins force US ethanol producers to reduce production of the biofuel.
CBOT May corn settled down 2-3/4 cents at $3.46 per bushel. For the week, the contract rose 2-1/4 cents a bushel or 0.65%, its first weekly rise in three weeks.
Analysts surveyed by Reuters on average expect the USDA next week to project US corn seedings at 94.3 million acres, up from 89.7 million in 2019, and soybeans plantings at 84.9 million acres, up from 76.1 million last year, when poor weather curbed acreage of both crops.