Strong December corn for ethanol use reported.

USDA's monthly ethanol plant report held positive news for corn. Usage in the month of December was strong at 482 million bushels. That was a large 13% over last year. Ethanol production in December was oddly strong. This helps bring our year to date total to 1.829 billion, a full +7.1% from last year. USDA does have an aggressive goal at 5.375 billion for the year. That would be +3.8%. So far, after four months, we are ahead of it.

The good news is our strong early-year pace only needs +2.3% activity for the next eight months to hit USDA hopes. The light concern is that January activity has so far dipped to -1.7% when including two weather impacted weeks. For now we are holding our whole-year view at USDA's hope.

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