Corn and soybeans futures closed modestly lower on Thursday, amid speculation of higher-than-expected U.S. corn acres plantings this spring and following a weak export sales report for both corn and soybeans issued Thursday morning. Export sales for the previous week showed corn at 17.7 million bushels down 66% from the previous week, soybeans came in at 12.5 million bushels, down 69% from last week. Analysts had been expecting corn export sales to come in between 30 to 37 million bushels and soybeans at 20-31 million bushels. The USDA outlook conference started today, which announced harvested acres at 86 million acres for corn and 77 million acres for soybeans, based on their planting projections. The department also forecast farm exports during 2009 to fall to $95.5 billion, down $20 billion from the prior year.
The USDA chief economist said today that 15% of U.S. ethanol capacity has been idled due to the slowing economy and falling crude prices, with current corn usage projected at 4.1 billion bushels for 2009/2010 marketing year, which is a little over a 3% increase from the current year.
The White House released their first budget plan today which moves aggressively to tackle climate change and shift the nation from reliance on foreign oil to green energy. The budget calls for significant increases in cutting-edge research into renewable energy, including solar, wind and geothermal sources and ways to produce non-corn ethanol, and eventually a gasoline-like fuel, from plants.
Crude oil closed the day up 6% as OPEC signals that it will cut production output again next month to push prices higher. Gold closed almost $24/troy oz. lower today as investors left "safe havens" for riskier commodities such as crude oil.
Chris Spurlock
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