LONDON: Raw sugar futures hit new six-month lows on Wednesday as funds reacted to technical sell signals and liquidated long bets, and analysts predicted a record crop next year. March raws were down 0.5 cents or 2.6 percent, at 18.13 cents a pound at 1405 GMT, earlier hitting a low of 18.09 cents, a level not seen since June 2.
Funds were liquidating longs due to sell signals set off by the price breaking a weekly low of 18.71 cents not reached since the week to July 29.
"We broke a weekly low of 18.71 and what that has done is reject a whole load of fund lengths that have accumulated in the period from August to October," one trader said.
"Having broken through that, we are seeing the overhang of long liquidation and a lack of news to maintain the bull story."
Fundamentals added to a bearish outlook, with sugar production expected to rise to a record level in 2017/18, leading to a small global surplus following two deficit seasons, according to Sucden. March white sugar futures were down $8.8 or 1.8 percent, at $490.4 a tonne, having hit a low of $490.1, last reached on June 2.
Robusta coffee edged higher as rainfall in Vietnam slowed the harvest in the world's top robusta producer.
March robusta was up $4, 0.2 percent, at $2,050 a tonne. Dealers said they were also keeping a close watch on Brazil where a shortage of robusta coffee is causing problems for domestic soluble coffee producers and leading to calls for imports to be allowed.
Brazil has a de facto ban on green coffee imports of both robusta and arabica beans on sanitary safety grounds, which protects growers on the local market from competition from producers in other countries.
March arabica coffee was off 1.6 cent or 1.1 percent at $1.4130 per lb.
Cocoa futures turned down again after two days of gains, on strong supply news from Ivory Coast.
Cocoa arrivals at ports in the world's top cocoa producer totalled around 647,000 tonnes by Dec. 11 since the start of the season on Oct. 1, a 5 percent increase on the same period last season, exporters estimated.
Ivory Coast cocoa grinders processed 85,000 tonnes of beans by the end of November, up 2.4 percent from the same period last season.
March New York cocoa was down $5, or 0.2 percent, at $2,284 a tonne.
March London cocoa was down 9 pounds, or 0.5 percent, at 1,816 pounds a tonne.
Comments
Comments are closed for this article.