Corn Gets a Thursday Pop With Sales Exceeding Expectations

Austin Schroeder Barchart Thu Dec 5, 4:53PM CST
Corn field blue sky by Alberto Masnovo via iStock

The corn market closed out the Thursday session with 3 ¾ to 5 cent gains, as Export Sales data was better than expected. The national average Cash Corn price from cmdtyView was up 5 cents at $4.07 1/2.

This morning’s Export Sales report showed 1.732 MMT in corn sales, a 4-week high and above the 0.75 to 1.5 MMT estimates for 2024/25 corn in the week of 11/28. That was also 63% above last week and 34.4% larger than the same week last year. Mexico was the largest buyer of 392,400 MT, with Japan purchasing 357,700 MT. Another 22,098 MT was sold for 2025/26, all to Mexico, with estimates at 0-200,000 MT.

October export data was released this morning, with 4.05 MMT (159.4 mbu) of corn shipped according to Census. That was the largest total for the month since 2018 but down 5.39% from September. Distillers exports were a record for the month at 1.114 MMT, which was also up 10.1% from last month. Ethanol shipments totaled 143.45 million gallons, the second largest all time for the month and down 3.38% from last month. 

Brazilian corn exports totaled 4.726 MMT during November according to the government’s data, which was well below October and down 36.2% from last year.

Dec 24 Corn  closed at $4.26 1/2, up 4 1/2 cents,

Nearby Cash  was $4.07 1/2, up 5 cents,

Mar 25 Corn  closed at $4.35, up 5 cents,

May 25 Corn  closed at $4.40 1/2, up 5 cents,


On the date of publication, Austin Schroeder did not have (either directly or indirectly) positions in any of the securities mentioned in this article. All information and data in this article is solely for informational purposes. For more information please view the Barchart Disclosure Policy here.