Short covering helped lift prices after the grain and soy markets neared one-month lows this week, analysts said. Optimism that Washington and Beijing will make progress to resolve their trade war also helped boost prices, after the Chinese Commerce Ministry on Thursday said China and the United States had plans for more face-to-face consultations over trade in January.
China separately opened the door to imports of rice from the United States in what analysts took to signal an easing of tensions. But corn prices faced pressure on Friday over ongoing concerns about ethanol profit margins, traders said.
The US Energy Information Administration said on Friday that weekly US output of corn-based ethanol fell to 1.04 million barrels per day, and stocks of the biofuel fell to 23.13 million barrels.
USDA's weekly export sales report, which had been scheduled for release on Friday, has been postponed indefinitely due to the federal government shutdown.