Ethanol production recovers after four prior disappointing weeks.

The first three quarters of corn for ethanol usage came to 4.066 billion bushels, +6.0% from last year. To meet USDA's current 5.450 billion whole-year goal this fourth quarter needs to run 1.384 billion, +3.3% from last year. Given the fact this year's production efficiency is lower than last year we estimate actual ethanol production only needs to run +2.0% from last year in this quarter. That is our goal for these weekly ethanol reports in Q4, +2.0%.

The first month of this last quarter, June, was disappointing with weekly ethanol production -0.9% to +0.5%. Today's weekly report, 1.054 million barrels per day in the first week of July, was +2.1% from last year. So we have four weeks at a light miss and one week on target. It is likely we will miss USDA's current whole-year corn for ethanol goal. For the coming July 12 WASDE we expect USDA to leave their view unchanged.

Last week's implied general gasoline usage was -2.1% from last year. Since the start of the corn marketing year, September 1, it has run -0.5%.

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