CHICAGO: Chicago Board of Trade corn futures climbed on Thursday on news of strong weekly exports, traders said.

CBOT most-active March corn settled 2-3/4 cents higher at $4.26-1/2 cents per bushel.

CBOT March corn futures rose above their 20-day moving average overnight.

Weekly corn export sales totaled 1.371 million tonnes, including 154,782 tonnes to China, the countries biggest purchase in two weeks, according to the US Department of Agriculture. Overall, corn export sales are down 18% from the previous week, but in line with trade forecasts of 800,000 tonnes to 1.6 million tonnes.