Chicago Board of Trade corn futures retreated on Thursday on technical selling and as an increase in cash grain sales by farmers this week triggered commercial selling as elevators and processors hedged their new physical longs, traders said. Benchmark CBOT March corn ended 1-1/2 cents lower at $3.51-1/2 a bushel after posting a near two-week high in the prior session.
The actively traded March contract briefly rose above chart resistance at its 50-day moving average around $3.52-1/4 but failed to hold those gains, prompting technical selling.
Ample supplies continued to overhang the corn market. The International Grains Council on Thursday raised its forecast for 2017/18 global corn production by 14 million tonnes to 1.054 billion tonnes.
Corn fell despite bullish ethanol production data. The Energy Information Administration said ethanol output last week rose by 65,000 barrels per day, rebounding from the previous week's pace that was the slowest since October.