Chicago Board of Trade corn futures were slightly higher on Friday, rebounding on light bargain buying from earlier life-of-contract lows following Thursday's bearish US Department of Agriculture plantings forecast, traders said. Corn on a continuous chart plunged about 4.5 percent for the week, in the largest weekly decline since July. Most of the losses came on Thursday, when USDA predicted 93.6 million acres would be planted to corn this year in the United States, above the high end of analyst expectations.
Corn volumes on Thursday reached a record 930,250 trades, the CME Group said on Friday. Open interest increased by more than 50,000 contracts, suggesting some investors were making new short or bearish bets on prices. Corn prices were lower for much of Friday's session, before a round of buying in the final minutes. Front-month CBOT May corn settled 2 cents higher at $3.53-1/2 per bushel, after earlier touching a contract low of $3.47-1/2.