BANGKOK: Tokyo rubber futures rose to their highest in more than a month on Tuesday on lingering hopes that China and the United States would take further steps to stimulate their economies.
The benchmark rubber contract on the Tokyo Commodity Exchange for February delivery rose 0.6 yen to settle at 236.9 yen ($3.03) per kg.
It rose to an intra-day high of 240.6 yen, the highest since July 23, before profit-taking set in.
The most-active rubber contract on the Shanghai futures exchange for January delivery was up 245 yuan to finish at 23,290 yuan ($3,700) per tonne.
The front-month rubber contract on Singapore's SICOM exchange for October delivery was last traded at $2.67 per kg, up 1.3 cents.
"Market players were still hopeful that there would be some measure to boost economies and demand after the Fed meeting. However, the rise in TOCOM prices was still capped by profit-taking," said a Bangkok-based dealer.
The US Federal Reserve is expected to start another series of quantitative easing, also known as QE3, after its policy meeting ends on Thursday.
Recent weak data from China has also raised hopes of more Beijing-backed spending to support the economy.
China's industrial output growth slowed to 8.9 percent year-on-year in August, the weakest since May 2009, while total imports were down 2.6 percent, against expectations for a 3.5 percent rise.
Rubber inventories in key Shanghai warehouses doubled from a month ago to reach its highest in over a year, as poor physical demand led producers in top consumer China to trade more on the futures market and take advantage of higher prices.
Dealers said TOCOM prices could slip lower on Wednesday as technical sentiment was weak after prices failed to break above a major resistance of 240 yen per kg.
Comments
Comments are closed.