Today's USDA Weekly Export Sales Report (7:30am CT) could help an otherwise quiet overnight CME Group corn, soybean and wheat trade.

The Early Calls for the commodities on Friday, September 7, 2012, are mostly higher. Corn is seen opening 2-4 cents higher, soybeans 3-5 cents lower, and wheat 2-4 cents higher.

In overnight trading, the Dec. corn futures contract traded 1 3/4 cents  higher at $8.00 per bushel. November soybean futures traded 7 1/4 cents lower at $17.39 per bushel, and Dec. wheat traded 2 1/4 cents higher at $8.94. For Dec. soybean meal futures, the contract traded $1.00 per short ton lower at $527.10. Dec. soybean oil futures traded $0.33 lower at $57.05.

The outside markets are mostly favorable for Friday's grain trade. The real factors driving the calls will be the mostly higher overnight markets.

The trade is expecting the USDA's corn export sales data to range between 200,000-350,000 metric tons, soybean exports of 600,000-775,000 metric tons, and wheat exports of 375,000-600,000 metric tons.

Discuss the corn, soybean and wheat markets in Marketing Talk.