NEW YORK/LONDON: Coffee futures on ICE rose on Thursday, with robusta extending its rebound above an 18-month low and arabica up from a 5-1/2-month trough, after reaching oversold technical levels that paused speculative selling.
COFFEE
March robusta coffee settled up $27, or 1.6 percent, at $1,740 per tonne, up roughly 4 percent from Tuesday's 1-1/2-year low of $1,676.
The speculative selling that took prices lower earlier in the week had waned and short-covering now lent support, dealers said.
"Going forward we think robusta will become tight again over the year," one dealer said. "But we've got a big Vietnam crop coming in now; the supply is nearby."
However, dealers said there was uncertainty over whether this new coffee would be offered for January delivery, with Vietnam bean differentials making it unattractive to deliver to the exchange.
March arabica coffee settled up 0.2 cent, or 0.2 percent, at $1.203 per lb, after falling to its weakest since June at $1.183 earlier this week.
"The futures markets are pricing in a widening of the spread between robusta and arabica coffee prices over the next year," said Capital Economics in a note.
Total arabica futures open interest jumped for the sixth straight session on Wednesday to reach 218,594 lots, up by nearly 27,500 lots during that period, exchange data showed.
Coffee stocks held in European ports declined by 4 percent in October, European Coffee Federation data showed.
SUGAR
March raw sugar settled down 0.08 cent, or 0.6 percent, at 13.77 cents per lb, hovering above Tuesday's 2-1/2 month low of 13.70.
Total open interest jumped by 16,029 contracts to 775,741 contracts on Wednesday, the highest since Sept. 19, ICE data showed.
Prices remained around technically oversold territory with some pressure coming from the weak Brazilian real versus the US dollar, which encourages more selling by boosting returns for producers in local currency terms.
Expectations for abundant global supplies continued to be a source of pressure, traders said.
World sugar production is forecast to rise 8 percent to a record 192 million tonnes in 2017-18, Informa's Agribusiness Intelligence said.
March New York cocoa settled up $5, or 0.3 percent, at $1,893 per tonne.
March London cocoa settled down 3 pounds, or 0.2 percent, at 1,411 pounds per tonne.
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