US corn futures firmed on Thursday due to a government forecast for reduced plantings this year as well as solid export demand, traders said. Short-covering added additional support to corn but gains were limited by declines in the wheat market. The US Agriculture Department on Thursday morning forecast US corn plantings for the 2014/15 crop year to fall to 92.0 million acres as part of a 0.7 percent reduction in the space farmers will devote to the eight major field crops.
Argentina's agriculture ministry left its estimate of the country's 2013/14 corn plantings unchanged at 5.7 million hectares. Bids for corn on the CIF market rose on Thursday, supported by demand for nearby shipments and firm barge freight, traders said. Analysts were expecting a USDA report on Friday morning to show that export sales of corn were in a range between 700,000 and 1.250 million tonnes (old crop and new crop combined) compared to 1.341 million a week ago.