We kicked off the day with Export Sales, Initial Jobless Claims, Philadelphia Fed Manufacturing Index, Philly Fed Business conditions, Philly Fed CAPEX Index, Philly Fed Employment, Philly Fed New Orders, Philly Fed Prices Paid, Jobless claims 4-Week Average, and Continuing Jobless Claims at 7:30 A.M., Existing Home sales, Existing Home Sales MoM, and CB Leading Index MoM at 9:00 A.M., EIA Natural Gas Storage at 9:30 A.M.4-Week & 8-Week Bill Auction at 10:30 A.M., Fed Waller Speech at 11:00 A.M., 5-Year TIPS Auction at 12:00 P.M., and Fed Bowman Speech at 2:00 P.M.

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On the Corn Front we settled on the lows in yesterday’s action with renewed whispers and fear of recession. The new crop corn spread widened versus the old crop as bulls feared for the worst and headed into a mass exodus. As they fail to predict inflation New York Fed president John Williams said credit conditions would likely deteriorate because of the bank crisis in March. Framers will be holding back on sales as the norm in planting and harvest season. The weather we are experiencing in the Corn Belt will slow plantings. Some areas had a good jump, however, under the weather conditions ahead it will be extremely hard to do fieldwork and plant, which put the brakes on. The on-again-off-again drama of reopening the Black Sea Grain Corridor has reopened after a two-day absence as Russia continues to play roulette in their unprovoked war. Cooler than normal temperatures are expected in the coming weeks coupled with rain will further hamper planting prospects as we move into May. Tomorrow we will report July corn as top step as First Notice day on all May grain complex will begin rollovers and the funds are weighted as net long corn. In the overnight electronic session the May corn is currently trading at 667 ½ which is 4 ¾ cents lower. The trading range has been 674 to 667.

On the Ethanol front production rose to 1.024 bpd last week, up from 959 bpd the previous week, above expectations and the highest in eight weeks. There was 103 mil. Bu. of corn used for fuel ethanol which is just below the USDA pace of corn usage forecast of 5.250 million bushels while gasoline demand fell 5%. Supply also grew to 25.296 million barrels which was 165,000 above last week and 951,000 more than last year. There were no trades or open interest in ethanol futures.

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