Corn Slipping to Start Monday

Group 1 - Corn prices have seen a slight decrease of 1.5 cents on Monday morning, with futures having increased by 1 to 4 cents on Friday, despite March futures dropping by 4.25 cents last week. Support from wheat gains contributed to this price action [1] - The national average cash corn price rose by 1.75 cents to $3.94 1/4, while the average December corn close for price discovery is $4.60, which is down by 10 cents compared to the same period last year [1] - Export sales data indicates strong performance, with old crop corn sales at 1.47 million metric tons (MMT) for the week of February 12, which is a 1.1% increase from the same week last year, despite a decrease from the previous week [2] Group 2 - Commitment of Traders data revealed a reduction of 20,795 contracts from the spec fund net long position for the week of February 17, resulting in a net short position of 27,415 contracts [3] - South Korean importers purchased a total of 130,000 metric tons in a tender, with expectations that at least half will be sourced from the US [3] - Brazil's first corn crop is reported to be 28% harvested, which is behind the average pace of 37%, while the second crop is 50% planted, lagging the average pace of 64% [4]