Reviewed August 2026 against USDA NASS, USDA AMS, and Trading Economics.

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CBOT corn futures settled at 437 ¢/bushel on August 11, 2026, per Trading Economics. That single number is set every trading session on the Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT), part of the CME Group, and it is the reference price the entire US corn market — from an Illinois country elevator to an export terminal — prices off of. This article explains what moves that number, how the Chicago grain market actually works, and how to place your first corn futures trade.

What Is the Chicago Grain Market?

“Chicago grain market” refers to trading in corn, wheat, and soybean futures contracts on the CBOT, now operated electronically by CME Group. A futures contract is a standardized agreement to buy or sell a set quantity of corn (5,000 bushels per contract) at a set price on a future delivery date. Farmers, grain elevators, exporters, ethanol plants, and livestock feeders use these contracts to lock in prices months ahead; traders and funds use the same contracts to speculate on where prices are headed.

The corn futures market does not trade in isolation. It reflects US supply (USDA’s planted acreage, yield, and production estimates), demand (exports, ethanol, livestock feed), and the cash price farmers actually receive at the elevator down the road, which is the futures price adjusted by a local “basis.”

CBOT Corn Futures: The Current Number and Where to Check It

As of August 11, 2026, CBOT corn futures settled at 437 ¢/bushel, according to Trading Economics, which publishes CME-sourced futures data. This is a snapshot, not a forecast — corn futures move every session the CBOT is open (Monday through Friday, excluding CME holidays), and CBOT publishes an official settlement price after each close.

To get today’s number rather than this one, check Trading Economics’ corn futures page or CME Group’s own site directly; both update after each session’s close. Do not rely on a cached number from an article — corn futures are one of the more actively repriced commodities on any given day, moving on weather, export sales data, and USDA report releases.

Corn Futures vs. Cash Price: Why They Differ

The CBOT futures price and the price a farmer is actually quoted at the local elevator are not the same number, and the gap between them (called “basis”) matters as much as the futures price itself for anyone selling physical corn.

USDA’s Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS) publishes daily cash bids and basis levels by region. On June 8, 2026, Illinois country elevators were bidding an average cash corn price of $3.98/bushel, a basis of -20 cents/bushel under the CBOT futures contract at the time, per USDA AMS’s daily grain report. A negative basis like this means the local cash price sits below the futures price — common in areas with strong local supply relative to storage and transport capacity out of the region.

Basis levels shift through the marketing year and differ by state and even by elevator, driven by local trucking costs, rail capacity, and how much corn is already in storage nearby. For a basis reading specific to your region, USDA AMS’s daily Illinois grain bid report is one of several regional reports AMS publishes; check the AMS market news portal for other states.

US Corn Supply: The Fundamentals Behind the Price

Futures prices ultimately trace back to how much corn the US actually grows and how much of it is needed. USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS) reported 2025 crop US corn production at 17.0 billion bushels, on an average yield of 186.5 bushels per acre — both figures from USDA NASS’s annual crop production data.

Yield and total production are the two numbers that move futures prices most on release days. A yield surprise of even a few bushels per acre versus trade expectations, revealed in USDA’s monthly WASDE (World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates) reports, routinely triggers same-day futures swings of several cents per bushel. USDA NASS releases updated production and yield estimates through the growing season, with the next official post-harvest estimate for the current crop year due from USDA’s August WASDE cycle — check USDA NASS’s corn production page directly for the current crop year’s figures, since a specific 2026 production forecast was not yet published in the sources checked for this piece.

How to Trade Corn Futures: A Step-by-Step Guide

Trading CBOT corn futures directly requires a futures account, which is distinct from a standard stock brokerage account. Here is the practical sequence:

1. Open a futures trading account. This requires a broker registered to clear CME Group futures (a Futures Commission Merchant, or FCM). You’ll need to meet margin requirements — the cash deposit held against potential losses on open positions.
2. Understand the contract specification. One CBOT corn futures contract covers 5,000 bushels. At a price of 437 ¢/bushel, one contract represents roughly $21,850 of corn in notional value — though margin required to hold the position is a fraction of that.
3. Pick your contract month. Corn futures trade in specific delivery months (March, May, July, September, December). Prices differ slightly between months based on storage costs and expected supply timing.
4. Decide long or short. Buying (going long) profits if corn prices rise; selling (going short) profits if prices fall. Farmers hedging a crop typically sell futures to lock in a price ahead of harvest; end users like ethanol plants typically buy futures to lock in an input cost.
5. Monitor margin daily. Futures accounts are marked to market every session — gains and losses on open positions settle in cash daily, which can trigger margin calls if the market moves against you.
6. Decide how you’ll exit. Most futures traders offset their position (sell what they bought, or buy back what they sold) before the contract’s delivery period rather than making or taking physical delivery of grain.

Options on corn futures are a lower-capital alternative for readers not ready to manage daily margin calls — they cap downside to the premium paid, at the cost of that premium. Either route, the CBOT settlement price described above is the benchmark every position is measured against.

What Actually Moves CBOT Corn Futures

Four categories of information move the corn futures market, roughly in order of typical impact:

• USDA reports — WASDE (monthly), Crop Production (monthly during the growing season), and Grain Stocks (quarterly) are the highest-impact scheduled releases; futures often move several cents per bushel within minutes of release.
• Weather — drought or excess rain during corn’s pollination window (typically July in the US Corn Belt) has an outsized effect on yield expectations and futures pricing.
• Export demand — USDA’s weekly export sales reports show how much US corn is being sold abroad; a stronger US dollar makes that corn more expensive for foreign buyers and can dampen demand, a dynamic worth tracking alongside the agricultural export process that gets US grain from farm to foreign buyer.
• Trade policy — tariff actions or retaliatory measures affecting major buyers (historically China has been the largest swing buyer of US corn and soybeans) can shift futures sharply on the day they’re announced, though the size and duration of any given policy’s price effect is specific to the measure and not something a general figure can capture — track USDA’s Foreign Agricultural Service trade data for the current policy environment.

Corn Futures Cost Calculator

Use your own contract count and price assumptions to see notional value, margin exposure, and breakeven basis — enter the numbers for your situation below.

Assumptions: notional value = contracts × 5,000 bu × price. Margin is a placeholder you should replace with your broker’s current requirement, which changes with CME volatility settings. Local cash price = futures price + basis. This excludes commissions, fees, and daily mark-to-market gains or losses.

Managing Price Risk Beyond the Futures Screen

Futures and options manage price risk after the corn is grown. The other half of margin risk is yield risk — and that starts in the field, months before any contract is bought or sold. Satellite-based crop monitoring tools track vegetation health, soil moisture, and stress signals through the season, giving growers an early read on whether their own yield is tracking above or below the USDA's regional average — information that matters directly when deciding how much of a crop to hedge and at what price.

Farmonaut's platform applies this kind of monitoring at the field level, and its data is also available programmatically through Farmonaut's API for operations that want to feed satellite-derived crop condition data into their own marketing decisions. Full endpoint documentation is available at Farmonaut's developer docs.

How to Keep This Data Current

Every price figure in this article has a shelf life. Here's where to refresh each one:

Treat any specific price or production figure — including the ones above — as a point-in-time reading. The method for finding today's version is the durable part of this article: check CBOT settlement data daily, USDA AMS basis reports for your region, and USDA NASS/WASDE releases on their monthly schedule.