Week Ending 1/23/26

It was a quiet week in the markets until Friday mornings export sales were released. March, May and July futures all ended the week 6 cents higher. The funds jumped in and bought 40,000+ contracts of corn on Friday ending the week short 64,367 corn contracts and long 23,624 soybean contracts.

A surprisingly large export sales report showed sales at 158 million bushels for the week with 50 million bushels to unknown destinations, 32 million to Japan and 30 million to South Korea. This was the largest single week for corn sales since March 2021. Last week’s sales increased the US pace to 3.46 billion bushels vs. the USDA’s forecast of 3.20 billion bushels.

Argentina crop conditions continue to deteriorate according to Buenos Aires Grain Exchange (BAGE) who is the premier organization in Argentina responsible for monitoring, analyzing and forecasting crop production. They updated their crop conditions last week and it continues to show a sharp fall out on conditions as dryness persists and heat moves in the coming week. They are still expecting a very good crop, but we are seeing the top end of production removed and may not see the extreme record that had been in play. This is important as the size of this crop drops the size of the US export program climbs.

The corn industry suffered a setback last week when the US House removed the Year Round E15 language from a funding bill. There was a lot of hope from the biofuel industry that this would slide through as part of a must-pass bill. A Year Round E15 waiver would clear the way for but not guarantee a major expansion of the E15 blend. Only 1.5% of the US fuel pumps are cleared to dispense E15 blends currently and most of them are in the Midwest. Estimates on how much corn demand would increase if E15 became available year-round range from 500 million to more than 2 billion bushels. An E15 expansion would take years to build infrastructure and consumer demand, but would support industry and producers

We have bounced about 40% off the low made following the January WASDE and could test the 50% mark this week. If weather continues to be negative in south America and exports remain strong we should have our lows in for the time being. I am not suggesting we cant move lower, but I look for things to stabilize in the $4.25 to $4.35 range for March futures for the next few weeks. The markets historically have a little rally in February, but it may be hard to rally much with a 2 billion plus carryout sitting on its back.

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