December Corn finished up 2 at 596, 8 1/2 off the high and 10 1/4 up from the low. March Corn closed up 1 1/2 at 615. This was 10 up from the low and 8 off the high.

Corn started lower today and remained under pressure throughout most of the session before firming slightly to finish near the middle of the day's range. Traders said that negative price influences included rain that fell overnight in Minnesota, Iowa, Wisconsin and in western and northern Illinois. Fund selling was also significant with funds selling more than 6000 contracts on the day through mid session. Finally, crude oil and the dollar reversed their overnight positions during the day with crude moving to sharply lower levels and the dollar rallying from lower on the day to higher during mid session. Tomorrow is first notice day for September corn. The USDA released its weekly Export Sales Report prior to the open and the corn numbers were somewhat better than trade expectations. Net sales for corn came in at 303,000 tonnes for the current marketing year which ends on August 31st. Net sales were 543,800 tonnes for the next marketing year for a total of 846,800 tonnes for the two crop years. Sales of 160,000 tonnes to an unknown destination were cancelled. The Energy Information Agency (EIA) released its monthly ethanol report for June this week. It showed a minor slowing in the annualized rate of US ethanol production from corn during June. That was not considered a surprise since June was the month when December corn traded roughly between 630 and 800 which sharply reduced profitability for corn-based ethanol producers. The annualized rate of usage in June was 3.203 billion bushels compared to 3.274 in May.

September Rice finished down 0.13 at 18.34, 0.35 off the high and equal to the low.