White sugar sets 3-1/2 year high, London cocoa also rises

LONDON: White sugar futures on ICE rose to a 3-1/2 year high on Monday, buoyed by fund buying against the backdrop of short-term supply tightness while London cocoa prices also advanced.

U.S.-based raw sugar, arabica coffee and New York cocoa futures contracts were shut on Monday for Martin Luther King Jr. Day and will reopen on Tuesday.

SUGAR

March white sugar ended $5.80, or 1.3pc, higher, at $467.50 per tonne after peaking at $468.70, the highest since May 2017.

Dealers said poor crops in Thailand and the European Union had helped to tighten supplies while Pakistan is among countries seeking to import the sweetener.

"Strong demand and a lack of containers in Asia is helping to raise whites prices," analyst Green Pool said in a report.

The prospect of lower imports by China in coming months could, however, ultimately help to cap prices.

"That possibility - of shrinking Chinese imports - is what makes us think that the current price surge is getting ahead of itself from a fundamental point of view," broker Marex Spectron said in a weekly update.

"But the sugar market is small and the amount of money sloshing around the world's markets is huge."

COCOA

March London cocoa rose 21 pounds, or 1.2pc, to close at 1,755 pounds a tonne.

The market was boosted by better-than-expected fourth quarter grind data from North America and Asia.

The European grind is due to come out on Wednesday.

The second wave of the global coronavirus pandemic has hit Ivory Coast's cocoa trading and exports hard, dashing hopes of an early recovery from the first wave, the director of the country's cocoa regulator CCC said on Sunday.

COFFEE

March robusta coffee closed down $10, or 0.7pc, at $1,343 a tonne.

Dealers noted a pick-up in selling out of top robusta producer Vietnam is expected ahead of next month's Tet holiday.